Enhanced photocatalytic H2 evolution over conjugated polymer/Au@TiO2 ternary heterojunction under visible light: Enriched photons input from polymers

Exploring efficient and stable TiO2-based photocatalysts for visible-light H2 evolution remains a great challenge. Here, a novel ternary heterojunction (THSO/Au@TiO2) was successfully synthesized by a facile in-situ polymerization strategy, which showed highly enhanced photocatalytic activity towards H2 evolution under visible light. The optimized THSO/Au@TiO2-26 exhibited an excellent photocatalytic performance to H2 evolution (7504 μmol/g/h), which was 16.31, 416.89 and 1.81 times higher than that of THSO, TiO2 and THSO/TiO2 photocatalysts, respectively. This excellent performance should be attributed to the excellent visible light absorption ability of the polymer THSO, and the local surface plasmonic resonance effect of Au nanoparticles (Au NPs), promoting separation and transfer of photo-generated charge carriers. This work presents new insights for the design of efficient and rational TiO2-based photocatalytic systems to enhance photocatalytic performance towards H2 evolution under visible light.