Journal
ACS CATALYSIS
Volume 10, Issue 24, Pages 15083-15091Publisher
AMER CHEMICAL SOC
DOI: 10.1021/acscatal.0c03918
Keywords
CO2 reduction; TaON; nonprecious cocatalysts; hollow structures; photocatalysis
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Funding
- Zhejiang Provincial Natural Science Foundation of China [LQ19E020002]
- National Natural Science Foundation of China [22005079, 51772071, 51872135]
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Photocatalytic CO2 reduction is hampered by the inefficient charge separation and kinetically challenging interfacial reaction. Combining nonprecious cocatalysts with semiconductors is vital for optimizing these processes. Herein, a step-by-step route is reported for the in situ growth of island-shaped graphene on TaON particles (TaON@G) with controllable distribution, targeting a superior photocatalyst for visible-light-driven CO2 reduction. The TaON@G photocatalyst possesses the snug contact interface with suitable interfacial energy levels for accelerating the charge separation, the island-shaped graphene with a hollow nanoarchitecture for facilitating the adsorption of CO2, and the hierarchical structure with spatially separated active sites for activating CO2 and promoting proton release. The optimized TaON@G achieves a visible-light-driven CO2-to-CH4 yield of 1.61 mu mol g(-1) h(-1), which is nearly 13-fold higher compared with that of pristine TaON and outperforms most Ta-based (oxy)nitride catalysts. Density functional theory calculations further elucidate the enhanced activity, suggesting that TaON interacts with graphene strongly with the charge transfer from TaON to graphene, inducing electron-rich graphene with a significant upshift of the graphene Fermi level, leading to a high filling fraction of the antibonding orbitals, thereby weakening the C=O bond of the adsorbed CO2 for breaking. Our study highlights the importance of rational design of well-defined hierarchical photocatalysis to synergistically integrate the structural and functional advantages for maximizing catalytic performance.
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