Conversion of ternary Zn2SnO4 octahedrons into binary mesoporous SnO2 and hollow SnS2 hierarchical octahedrons by template-mediated selective complex extraction

The controlled synthesis of mesoporous or hollow nonspherical hierarchical architectures still remains a tremendous challenge. On the other hand, the conversion of multielement semiconducting microcrystals into binary ones with inherited morphology has never been explored until now. Here we report that ternary Zn2SnO4 octahedrons can be converted into mesoporous binary SnO2 and hollow SnS2 hierarchical octahedrons through hydrothermal extraction. The favorable structures of the as-obtained SnO2 and SnS2 leads to the observation of enhanced photocatalytic activities. The new complex-extraction strategy can be generalized and thus open a new avenue for synthesis of functional materials with unique hollow architectures.