ZnO-based heterostructure constructed using HKUST-1 for enhanced visible-light photocatalytic hydrogen evolution

ZnO is a promising candidate for photocatalysts, whereas suffered from low activity due to the insufficient visible-light absorption and rapid recombination of photogenerated charges. In order to improve the visible-light catalytic activity of unmodified ZnO, a ZnO/Cu2O/CuO (ZCC) heterostructure photocatalyst constructed from in-situ growth of Cu-based MOF (HKUST-1) on ZnO nanosheets by in-situ growth was designed for photocatalytic H2 evolution, which exhibited excellent visible-light H2 production rate of 467.1 μmol h−1 g−1. It was confirmed that the enhanced photoactivity was mainly attributed to the wide visible-light absorption range and improvement of active sites. The construction of heterostructure promoted the migration and separation of photogenerated charges and enhanced the synergistic effect between the multicomponent hybrid semiconductor materials. This work highlights the design of using MOFs as precursor to construct metal oxide heterostructures with ZnO nanosheets for visible-light photocatalytic H2 production.