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A quasi-hexagonal prism-shaped carbon nitride for photoreduction of carbon dioxide under visible light

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Abstract

A quasi-hexagonal prism-shaped carbon nitride (H-C3N4) was synthesized from urea-derived C3N4 (U-C3N4) using an alkaline hydrothermal process. U-C3N4 decomposition followed by hydrogen bond rearrangement of hydrolyzed products leads to the formation of a quasi-hexagonal prism-shaped structure. The H-C3N4 catalysts displayed superior activity in the photoreduction of CO2 with H2O compared to U-C3N4. The enhanced photocatalytic activities can be attributed to the promotion of incompletely coordinated nitrogen atom formation in the C3N4 molecules.

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Acknowledgements

This work was supported by the Program for Changjiang Scholars and Innovative Research Team in University (Grant IRT13096), the National Natural Science Foundation of China (Grants 21177115 and 21477117), and the Zhejiang Provincial Natural Science Foundation of China (Grants LR13B070002 and LR14E080001).

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. College of Environment, Zhejiang University of Technology, Hangzhou, 310032, People’s Republic of China

    Zhiqiao He, Danfen Wang, Juntao Tang, Shuang Song & Jianmeng Chen

  2. College of Materials Science and Engineering, Zhejiang University of Technology, Hangzhou, 310014, People’s Republic of China

    Xinyong Tao

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  1. Zhiqiao He
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  2. Danfen Wang
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  3. Juntao Tang
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  4. Shuang Song
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Correspondence to Shuang Song or Xinyong Tao.

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He, Z., Wang, D., Tang, J. et al. A quasi-hexagonal prism-shaped carbon nitride for photoreduction of carbon dioxide under visible light. Environ Sci Pollut Res 24, 8219–8229 (2017). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11356-017-8497-4

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