Hydrothermal Synthesis g-C₃N₄/Nano-InVO₄ Nanocomposites and Enhanced Photocatalytic Activity for Hydrogen Production under Visible Light Irradiation

Abstract

We synthesized g-C3N4/nano-InVO4 heterojunction-type photocatalyts by in situ growth of InVO4 nanoparticles onto the surface of g-C3N4 sheets via a hydrothermal process. The results of SEM and TEM showed that the obtained InVO4 nanoparticles 20 nm in size dispersed uniformly on the surface of g-C3N4 sheets, which revealed that g-C3N4 sheets was probably a promising support for in situ growth of nanosize materials. The achieved intimate interface promoted the charge transfer and inhibited the recombination rate of photogenerated electron-hole pairs, which significantly improved the photocatalytic activity. A possible growth process of g-C3N4/nano-InVO4 nanocomposites was proposed based on different mass fraction of g-C3N4 content. The obtained g-C3N4/nano-InVO4 nanocomposites could achieve effective separation of charge-hole pairs and stronger reducing power, which caused enhanced H2 evolution from water-splitting compared with bare g-C3N4 sheets and g-C3N4/micro-InVO4 composites, respectively. As a result, the g-C3N4/nano-InVO4 nanocomposite with a mass ratio of 80:20 possessed the maximum photocatalytic activity for hydrogen production under visible-light irradiation.

A Carbon Quantum Dots/Porous InVO4 Microsphere Composite with Enhanced Photocatalytic Activity

“…Compared with the p‐InVO 4 microspheres, the as‐prepared composites have a higher absorption in both the UV‐light region and the visible‐light region, and the absorption edges of CQDs/p‐InVO 4 have a significant redshift. Additionally, the band gaps of the composites are obtained by extrapolating the linear portion of [ α h υ ] 2 versus (h υ ) curves . As depicted in Figure b, the E g (semiconductor bandgap) of the p‐InVO 4 microspheres is estimated to be about 2.21 eV, which is close to that reported in the literature .…”

Direct Growth of CuO Nanorods on Graphitic Carbon Nitride with Synergistic Effect on Thermal Decomposition of Ammonium Perchlorate

“…In the case of the g-C 3 N 4 /CuO nanocomposite, CuO were all nano-sized and well dispersed throughout the micron-sized g-C 3 N 4 . Previous studies have indicated that active sites exposed on the surface of nanocomposite would significantly increase the enhancement well dispersed nano-component concentrations to some extent [49,50]. Thus, g-C 3 N 4 /20 wt % CuO exhibited higher catalytic performance on the thermal decomposition of AP than g-C 3 N 4 /10 wt % CuO and g-C 3 N 4 /5 wt % CuO, respectively.…”

Bio-inspired Z-scheme g-C3N4/Ag2CrO4 for efficient visible-light photocatalytic hydrogen generation

“…As far as bare g-C 3 N 4 was concerned, normally, the photogenerated electron-hole pairs quickly recombined and only a fraction of them participated in water splitting reaction, resulting in low photocatalytic activity 5,6,15,21 . Based on the above analysis of the experiment and characterization results, the possible photocatalytic reaction mechanism and electron transfer processes of the g-C 3 N 4 /Ag 2 CrO 4 nanocomposites were proposed (Fig.…”