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Efficient defect-controlled photocatalytic hydrogen generation based on near-infrared Cu-In-Zn-S quantum dots

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Abstract

The development of photocatalysts that can effectively harvest visible light is essential for advances in high-efficiency solar-driven hydrogen generation. Herein, we synthesized water soluble CuInS2 (CIS) and Cu-In-Zn-S (CIZS) quantum dots (QDs) by using one-pot aqueous method. The CIZS QDs are well passivated by glutathione ligands and are highly stable in aqueous conditions. We subsequently applied these QDs as a light harvesting material for photocatalytic hydrogen generation. Unlike most small band gap materials that show extremely low efficiency, these new QDs display remarkable energy conversion efficiency in the visible and near-infrared regions. The external quantum efficiency at 650 nm is ∼1.5%, which, to the best of our knowledge, is the highest value achieved until now in the near-infrared region.

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Acknowledgements

This work is supported by the start-up funding from ShanghaiTech University, the Young 1000 Talents Program, the National Natural Science Foundation of China (Nos. U1632118, 21571129, and 21571129), the National Basic Research Program of China (Nos. 2016YFA0204000 and 2013CB733700), Science and Technology Commission of Shanghai Municipality (Nos. 16JC1402100 and 16520720700) and the National Natural Science Foundation of China for Creative Research Groups (No. 21421004). We thank Dr. Yanyan Jia at the testing center at School of Physical Science and Technology, Protein center.

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  1. Xiao-Yuan Liu and Guozhen Zhang contributed equally to this work.

Authors and Affiliations

  1. School of Physical Science and Technology, ShanghaiTech University, Shanghai, 201210, China

    Xiao-Yuan Liu, Hao Chen & Zhijun Ning

  2. Key Laboratory for Advanced Materials & School of Chemistry and Molecular Engineering, East China University of Science and Technology, Shanghai, 200237, China

    Xiao-Yuan Liu, Haowen Li & Yi-Tao Long

  3. School of Chemistry and Materials Science, Hefei National Laboratory for Physical Sciences at the Microscale and CAS Key Laboratory of Mechanical Behavior and Design of Materials (LMBD), University of Science and Technology of China (USTC), Hefei, 230026, China

    Guozhen Zhang & Jun Jiang

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  1. Xiao-Yuan Liu
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Correspondence to Yi-Tao Long or Zhijun Ning.

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Liu, XY., Zhang, G., Chen, H. et al. Efficient defect-controlled photocatalytic hydrogen generation based on near-infrared Cu-In-Zn-S quantum dots. Nano Res. 11, 1379–1388 (2018). https://doi.org/10.1007/s12274-017-1752-7

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