Synergy of Iron Doping and Cyano Groups for Enhanced Photocatalytic Hydrogen Production over C3 N4.

Abstract

Improving the insufficient carrier separation dynamics is still of significance in carbon nitride (C3 N4 ) research. Extensive research has been devoted to improving the carrier separation efficiency through a single strategy, while ignoring the synergistic enhancement effect produced by coupling two or more conventional strategies. Herein, we reported the fabrication of cyano group-containing Fe-doped C3 N4 porous materials via direct co-calcination of iron acetylacetonate and melamine for synergistically improving the photocatalytic performance. Iron acetylacetonate can promote the generation of cyano groups and form Fe-doping in C3 N4 , thereby increasing the visible-light absorption and reactive sites. Further, the internal donor-acceptor system formed by cyano groups and Fe-doped sites promoted charge carrier separation and inhibited the radiation recombination of e- -h+ pairs. The optimized photocatalytic activity of Fe-CN-2 sample was 4.5 times of bulk C3 N4 (BCN).