In situ self-transformation synthesis of g-C3N4-modified CdS heterostructure with enhanced photocatalytic activity

Abstract The fabrication of heterojunction photocatalysts with uniform dispersion and strongly coupling interface is one of the main strategies to improve the photocatalytic activity of semiconductor materials. In this study, the heterostructured g-C3N4/CdS photocatalyst with above features was synthesized via a facile in situ high-temperature self-transformation method by using melamine-CdS composites as the precursor. The results showed that g-C3N4 nanoparticles (5–30 nm) are homogeneously grafted on the CdS surface with closely contacted interfaces, resulting in a greatly improved photocatalytic hydrogen-production performance. When the amount of g-C3N4 was 1 wt%, the resultant g-C3N4/CdS showed the highest hydrogen evolution rate (5303 μmol h−1 g−1), which is significantly higher than the pure CdS by a factor of 2.5 times. Considering the obviously enhanced performance of CdS by loading a very limited g-C3N4 (0.1–5 wt%), a possible photocatalytic mechanism was proposed, namely, the g-C3N4 works as an effective hole-transfer cocatalyst to promote the rapid transfer of photogenerated holes from the CdS surface, causing the effective separation of photogenerated charges in CdS. Our present work can provide some interesting idea for the reasonable design and preparation of other highly efficient heterojunction photocatalysts.