Facile Insights into Hydrothermal Synthesis of Ultrathin Bi<sub>4</sub>NbO<sub>8</sub>Cl Nanosheets for Efficient CO<sub>2</sub> Photoreduction
Ming Yan, Fan Jiang, Jingjing Zhen, Yilin Wu
Abstract
Developing novel two-dimensional photocatalysis is an excellent strategy for high-efficiency CO2 photoreduction. Herein, for the first time, we demonstrate a facile hydrothermal synthesis method to construct ultrathin Bi4NbO8Cl nanosheets using tartaric acid as a complexing agent, which can restrain the speed of nucleation. The ultrathin Bi4NbO8Cl nanosheets exhibit excellent catalytic activity of CO and CH4 production (10.84 and 4.45 μmol g–1 h–1), which are up to 1.9 and 1.4 times higher than those of the bulk Bi4NbO8Cl, respectively. Photoelectric experiments and mechanism analysis systematically show that the as-obtained enhanced performance should be attributed to the formation of ultrathin Bi4NbO8Cl nanosheets, and charge separation and migration are significantly boosted. Therefore, this ultrathin Bi4NbO8Cl structure has provided new insights into the controllable preparation of ultrathin nanosheet photocatalysts to effectively improve the catalytic performance.