In-situ formation of nanosized 1T-phase MoS2 in B-doped carbon nitride for high efficient visible-light-driven H2 production

The high photogenerated carrier recombination rate and the low visible light utilization limit the development of graphitic carbon nitride (CN) in industrial photocatalytic H2 generation. Herein, 1T-phase MoS2 nanoparticles with high conductivity and more active sites are in-situ grown on B-doped carbon nitride (CNB) nanosheets through a one-step hydrothermal method. The doping of boron element effectively improves the harvesting visible light ability by tuning the energy gap, while the introduction of 1T-phase MoS2 successfully increases the carrier transfer rate by suppressing charge trapping. An optimized H2 production activity of 5334 μmol h-1 g-1 with the apparent quantum efficiency of 10.2% is achieved by 1T-MoS2/CNB sample, which is 167 times higher than that of pure CN. The mechanism is systematically illustrated by the combination of DFT calculations and transient absorption measurements. This work provides a new way for the construction of transition metal-derived co-catalysts in photocatalytic hydrogen energy storage.