Preparation condition optimization and stability of cubic phase CdS in photocatalytic hydrogen production†

Cadmium sulphide (CdS) is a promising material for photocatalytic hydrogen production. Compared with hexagonal CdS (h-CdS), the research on cubic CdS (c-CdS) is much less. Especially, detailed studies on the preparation condition optimization and photostability of c-CdS are still insufficient. In this paper, c-CdS was prepared by a simple precipitation method and characterized by XRD, SEM, TEM and XPS techniques. Firstly, the Cd to S molar ratio and aging time were optimized to find out their influences on the crystal structure, morphology, chemical state and hydrogen production performance of CdS. The c-CdS obtained at a Cd : S ratio of 5 : 8 and an aging time of 6 h (denoted as CdS-8-6) possesses the highest performance of 37.7 mu mol h(-1). Secondly and more importantly, cyclic hydrogen production tests were conducted on CdS-8-6 and a series of determinations were carried out on the recovered samples to investigate its photostability during reaction.

Automated summary

In this study, cubic CdS with promising photocatalytic performance was successfully prepared by a simple precipitation method. The optimization of preparation conditions and investigation of photostability were systematically conducted to provide insights into the performance of cubic CdS for hydrogen production.