Self-catalysed breakdown of titanate nanotubes by graphitic carbon nitride resulting in enhanced hydrogen production

Efficient design of a photocatalyst is an important step in realizing real world applications. In this work, using in-situ catalysis we have prepared and investigated a titanate nanotube (TiNT)/ graphitic carbon nitride nanocomposite, which after optimization shows excellent hydrogen production effi...

Full description

Saved in:
Bibliographic Details
Main Authors: Ruochen Liu, Shiqi Zhao, Xiaorong Cheng, Luhua Lu, Xiyang Liu, Tianqi Liu, Bochao Dong, Graham Dawson
Format: Article
Language:English
Published: Elsevier 2025-04-01
Series:Next Materials
Subjects:
Online Access:http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S2949822824002557
Tags: Add Tag
No Tags, Be the first to tag this record!
Description
Summary:Efficient design of a photocatalyst is an important step in realizing real world applications. In this work, using in-situ catalysis we have prepared and investigated a titanate nanotube (TiNT)/ graphitic carbon nitride nanocomposite, which after optimization shows excellent hydrogen production efficiency of 2.3 mmolg−1h−1, much improved compared to GCN, which achieved a rate of 0.56 mmolg−1h−1. We can conclude that pyrolysis of urea to carbon nitride also self catalyses the breakdown of TiNT into anatase TiO2 nanoparticles, resulting in a nanocomposite material comprising TiO2 and heterojunctions with GCN. After heating and modification the TiO2 shows a conduction band edge with a more negative potential than the H+/H2 potential, which along with the ideal position of the GCN CB edge facilitates hydrogen production under light irradiation. This novel method can be viewed as a general method for improving catalysis synthesis and design, whilst simultaneously reducing the complexity and energy footprint of active catalyst synthesis.
ISSN:2949-8228