Addressing the synchronized impact of a novel strontium titanium over copolymerized carbon nitride for proficient solar-driven hydrogen evolution

Zeeshan Ajmal; Mahmood Ul Haq; Shahid Zaman; M K Al-Muhanna; Anuj Kumar; Mohammed M Fadhali; Siwar Ben Hadj Hassine; Muhammas Qasim; K F Alshammari; Ghulam Abbas Ashraf; Abdul Qadeer; Adil Murtaza; Sulaiman Al-Sulaimi; Huaqiang Zeng

doi:10.1016/j.jcis.2023.10.020

Addressing the synchronized impact of a novel strontium titanium over copolymerized carbon nitride for proficient solar-driven hydrogen evolution

J Colloid Interface Sci. 2024 Feb:655:886-898. doi: 10.1016/j.jcis.2023.10.020. Epub 2023 Oct 9.

Authors

Affiliations

¹ Key Laboratory of the Ministry of Education for Advanced Catalysis Materials, Institute of Advanced Fluorine-Containing Materials, College of Chemistry and Material Science, Zhejiang Normal University, Jinhua 321004, Zhejiang, China; School of Chemistry and Chemical Engineering, Northwestern Polytechnical University, 710072 Xian, China. Electronic address: zeeshan@nwpu.edu.cn.
² Key Laboratory of the Ministry of Education for Advanced Catalysis Materials, Institute of Advanced Fluorine-Containing Materials, College of Chemistry and Material Science, Zhejiang Normal University, Jinhua 321004, Zhejiang, China.
³ Institut d'Innovations en Écomatériaux, Écoproduits et Écoénergies, Université du Québec à Trois-Rivières (UQTR), 3351 boul. des forges, Trois-Rivières, Québec G8Z 4M3, Canada.
⁴ The Material Science Research Institute, King Abdulaziz City for Science and Technology (KACST), Riyadh 11442, Saudi Arabia.
⁵ Nanotechnology Research Laboratory, GLA, University, Mathura, Uttar Pradesh 281406, India.
⁶ Department of Physics, Faculty of Science, Jazan University, Jazan 45142, Saudi Arabia.
⁷ Department of Computer Science, College of Science and Arts at Muhayel, King Khalid University, Saudi Arabia.
⁸ School of Electronic Engineering, Jiujiang University, Jiujiang 332005, China.
⁹ Department of Criminal Justice and Forensics, King Fahad Security College, Riyadh 11461, Saudi Arabia.
¹⁰ College of Environment, Hohai University, Nanjing 210098, China; New Uzbekistan University, Mustaqillik Ave. 54, Tashkent 100007, Uzbekistan. Electronic address: ga_phy@yahoo.com.
¹¹ State Key Laboratory of Environmental Criteria and Risk Assessment, Chinese Research Academy of Environmental Science, Beijing, China.
¹² MOE Key Laboratory for Non-equilibrium Synthesis and Modulation of Condensed Matter, State Key Laboratory for Mechanical Behaviour of Materials, Key Laboratory of Advanced Functional Materials and Mesoscopic Physics of Shaanxi Province, School of Physics, Xian Jiaotong University, 710049 Xian, Shaanxi, China. Electronic address: adilmurtaza91@mail.xjtu.edu.cn.
¹³ Department of Biological Science and Chemistry, University of Nizwa, Oman. Electronic address: s.salimi@unizwa.edu.om.
¹⁴ School of Chemistry and Chemical Engineering, Northwestern Polytechnical University, 710072 Xian, China. Electronic address: hzeng@fzu.edu.cn.

PMID: 37979294
DOI: 10.1016/j.jcis.2023.10.020

Abstract

Currently, novel technologies are highly prerequisite as an outstanding approach in the field of photocatalytic water splitting (PWS). Previous research has shown that copolymerization technology could improve the photocatalytic performance of pristine carbon nitride (CN) more efficiently. As this technology further allows the charge carrier recombination constraints, due to novel monomer-incorporated highly abundant surface-active sites of metals in polymeric carbon nitride-based heterojunction. However, in present study, a novel previously unexplored thiophenedicarboxaldehyde (TAL) conjugated, strontium-titanium (SrTiO₃) induced and CN based heterojunction, i.e., SrTiO₃/CN-TAL_10.0, was prepared for solar-driven hydrogen evolution reaction (HER). This heterojunction effectively enables the proficient isolation of photoinduced charge carriers and enhanced the charge transport over the surface junction, by enhancing the optical absorption range and average lifetime of photogenerated charges. The incorporation of TAL within the structure of CN via copolymerization highly increases the photocatalytic activity, as well as maintaining its photostability performance. The SrTiO₃ concentration and the proportion of TAL among CN can be precisely controlled to provide the optimal photocatalytic efficiency with a maximum HER of 285.9 µmol/h under visible light (λ = 420 nm). Based on these results, our optical analysis shows that coupling of SrTiO₃ and TAL monomer in the structure of CN considerably reduce the band gap of superior sample from (3.42 to 2.66 eV), thereby, signifying the outstanding photocatalytic performance of SrTiO₃/CN-TAL_10.0. Thus, this study provide a new guideline in order to develop the multidimensional photocatalysts with proper functioning for sustainable energy conversion and production.

Keywords: Carbon nitride; Copolymerization; Heterojunction; Photocatalytic hydrogen evolution; Strontium-titanium; Thiophenedicarboxyl.