Mesoporous CdZnS with abundant surface defects for efficient photocatalytic hydrogen production.

The practical application of photocatalytic water splitting for hydrogen evolution hinges on the development of high-efficient and low-cost photocatalysts. Defects engineering has emerged as a promising strategy to enhance photocatalytic activity effectively. Herein, a facile and versatile co-precipitation method is proposed to fabricate mesoporous Cd-Zn-S solid solutions (E-CdZnS) with abundant surface defects by the inorganic salts formed in the reaction system as self-template. Compared with Cd-Zn-S solid solutions (W-CdZnS) prepared by the traditional co-precipitation method, the enhanced specific surface area and abundant surface defects endow E-CdZnS with more accessible active sites and effective separation of electron-hole pairs for the photocatalytic water splitting reaction. The E-CdZnS solid solution exhibits hydrogen evolution rate of 5.2 mmol h g without loading noble metal as cocatalyst under visible light, which is 1.13 times higher than that of W-CdZnS sample. The present work provides a simple, low-cost and prospective strategy for the synthesis of defective Cd-Zn-S solid solutions, and it also delivers guidance to design and develop the advanced visible-light photocatalyst in the future.