Simultaneous manipulation of ion doping and cocatalyst loading into Mn0.3Cd0.7S nanorods toward significantly improved H2 evolution

Abstract

The separation and transfer of e⁻ and h⁺ are of great significance for H₂ generation during the photocatalytic process. In this work, we constructed Ni₂P and Ni²⁺ jointly modified Mn_0.3Cd_0.7S photocatalysts via a facile solvothermal methodology. The loading of Ni₂P serving as a cocatalyst provided more reactive sites and reduced the H₂ production overpotential. Moreover, doping with Ni²⁺ would introduce impurity levels, inducing the redshift of the absorption edge. The synergistic effect between Ni₂P and Ni²⁺ obviously improved the photocatalytic activity of Mn_0.3Cd_0.7S. The H₂ evolution rate of Ni₂P/Ni²⁺–Mn_0.3Cd_0.7S-10 increased remarkably with the maximum reaching up to 60.45 mmol g⁻¹ h⁻¹, which was up to 1474 times that over bare Mn_0.3Cd_0.7S.