Carbon‐Based, Metal‐Free Catalysts for Photocatalysis

Jin, Xiaojuan; Yang, Hongsheng; Chen, Nan; Qu, Liangti

doi:10.1002/9783527811458.vol2-ch5

Cited by 1 publication

(1 citation statement)

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“…For these reasons, metal-free carbon-based semiconductor materials (doped graphenes, carbon nanotubes, carbon dots, carbon nitrides, etc.) have been recently proposed as good candidates in photocatalytic applications due to their robustness, large surface area, and optoelectronic properties, among others (Jin et al, 2018;Albero et al, 2019;Chu et al, 2020;Guo et al, 2020;Haiyan et al, 2020;Kandy, 2020;Mazzanti and Savateev, 2020;Reischauer and Pieber, 2021;Zou et al, 2021).…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

CxNy: New Carbon Nitride Organic Photocatalysts

López‐Salas

Albero

2021

Front. Mater.

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The search for metal-free and visible light-responsive materials for photocatalytic applications has attracted the interest of not only academics but also the industry in the last decades. Since graphitic carbon nitride (g-C3N4) was first reported as a metal-free photocatalyst, this has been widely investigated in different light-driven reactions. However, the high recombination rate, low electrical conductivity, and lack of photoresponse in most of the visible range have elicited the search for alternatives. In this regard, a broad family of carbon nitride (CxNy) materials was anticipated several decades ago. However, the attention of the researchers in these materials has just been awakened in the last years due to the recent success in the syntheses of some of these materials (i.e., C3N3, C2N, C3N, and C3N5, among others), together with theoretical simulations pointing at the excellent physico-chemical properties (i.e., crystalline structure and chemical morphology, electronic configuration and semiconducting nature, or high refractive index and hardness, among others) and optoelectronic applications of these materials. The performance of CxNy, beyond C3N4, has been barely evaluated in real applications, including energy conversion, storage, and adsorption technologies, and further work must be carried out, especially experimentally, in order to confirm the high expectations raised by simulations and theoretical calculations. Herein, we have summarized the scarce literature related to recent results reporting the synthetic routes, structures, and performance of these materials as photocatalysts. Moreover, the challenges and perspectives at the forefront of this field using CxNy materials are disclosed. We aim to stimulate the research of this new generation of CxNy-based photocatalysts, beyond C3N4, with improved photocatalytic efficiencies by harnessing the striking structural, electronic, and optical properties of this new family of materials.

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