Synergistic Effect of Titanate-Anatase Heterostructure
and Hydrogenation-Induced Surface Disorder on Photocatalytic Water
Splitting
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Abstract
Black TiO<sub>2</sub> obtained by
hydrogenation has attracted enormous
attention due to its unusual photocatalytic activity. In this contribution,
a novel photocatalyst containing both a titanate–anatase heterostructure
and a surface disordered shell was in situ synthesized by using a
one-step hydrogenation treatment of titanate nanowires at ambient
pressure, which exhibited remarkably improved photocatalytic activity
for water splitting under simulated solar light. The as-hydrogenated
catalyst with a heterostructure and a surface disordered shell displayed
a high hydrogen production rate of 216.5 μmol·h<sup>–1</sup>, which is ∼20 times higher than the Pt-loaded titanate nanowires
lacking of such unique structure. The in situ-generated heterostructure
and hydrogenation-induced surface disorder can efficiently promote
the separation and transfer of photoexcited electron–hole pairs,
inhibiting the fast recombination of the generated charge carriers.
A general synergistic effect of the heterostructure and the surface
disordered shell on photocatalytic water splitting is revealed for
the first time in this work, and the as-proposed photocatalyst design
and preparation strategy could be widely extended to other composite
photocatalytic systems used for solar energy conversion