One-step synthesis of sulfur and tungstate co-doped porous g-C3N4 microrods with remarkably enhanced visible-light photocatalytic performances

Abstract

An immediate challenge in photocatalysis is to develop stable semiconductor photocatalysts with low cost and high efficiency. Here, porous sulfur and tungstate co-doped graphitic carbon nitride (S/W-CN) microrods were synthesized via a facile thermal polymerization process from low-cost precursor. The porous microrods endow S/W-CN with high aspect ratio, more active sites, and short charges diffusion distance. Compared to bulk graphitic carbon nitride (CN), the S/W-CN presents a much higher specific surface area and stronger photogenerated carrier separation capacity. Therefore, under the visible-light irradiation, the as-prepared S/W-CN exhibits the high H2 evolution rate of 857.3 μmol h−1 g−1 and tetracycline (TC) degradation rate of 85.3%, together with the good stability. This work proposes an effective idea for developing the high-performance and low-cost semiconductor photocatalysts.