Rapid polymerization synthesizing high crystalline g C3N4 towards boosting solar photocatalytic H2 generation
Abstract Graphitic carbon nitride (g C3N4) is a promising metal free photocatalyst for solar photocatalytic hydrogen gas (H2) generation from water. In particularly, high crystalline g C3N4 (GCN HC) material with fewer structural defects possesses the fast photoexcited electron hole pair's separation efficiency as comparison with bulk g C3N4 (GCN B) powders, leading to the drastic improvement of photocatalytic activity. However, the fabrication of such GCN HC photocatalyst by a simple and economical synthesis approach still remains a challenge. Herein, we firstly develop a one step rapid polymerization strategy for synthesizing the GCN HC, that is direct calcination of melamine at 550 degC not only without the early heating process, but also without the assistance of any additive or salt intercalation. As a result, the GCN HC exhibits an obviously boosting visible light induced photocatalytic H2 generation performance, which is over 2.06 folds much greater than that of GCN B. Our work provides an available one step synthetic strategy for the large scale preparation of high performance GCN HC towards sustainable solar to chemical energy conversion.