InOOH-mediated intergrown heterojunctions for enhanced photocatalytic performance: assembly and interfacial charge carrier transferring

Abstract

Heterojunction photocatalysts with the appropriate band structure and abundant interfacial sites present promising photocatalytic performance. Research in this field has generally been focusing on incorporating dissimilar materials to prepare heterojunctions. Few studies show how to construct intergrown heterojunctions that structurally, the interfacial region is narrowed down to atomic scale, facilitating charge carrier transferring and avoiding potentially unfavoured band bending. This work for the first time reports the intergrowth of InOOH/In(OH)3 and InOOH/In2O3 heterojunction photocatalysts and their greatly enhanced photocatalytic property towards perfluorooctanoic acid decomposition. The experimental and theoretical investigation indicate that band structure matching is essential for heterojunction photocatalysts. Fast interfacial charge carrier transferring offers additional charge carriers but does not always occur in the heterojunctions where other effects may play the dominated role in interfacial region. We believe that this comprehensive understanding of intergrown heterojunctions would benefit the design and application of high performance photocatalysts. Show more