Square meter lever and durable photocatalytic hydrogen production by manipulating the growth of a graphdiyne morphology S-scheme heterojunction

Graphdiyne is a promising photocatalytic material for solar energy conversion because of its high carrier mobility and ordered pore structure. In this work, a novel spherical graphdiyne (S-GDY) was prepared by crosscoupling and cleverly coupled with rod-like Mn0.2Cd0.8S to form an S-scheme heterojunction for photocatalytic hydrogen evolution, which is applied for the first time in this field. As anticipated, the Mn0.2Cd0.8S/S-GDY heterojunction photocatalyst showed remarkable photocatalytic activity, exceeding the individual catalysts Mn0.2Cd0.8S and S-GDY by factors of 16.78 and 613.2, respectively. Moreover, it was successfully applied to hydrogen production on the square meter scale. The exceptional photocatalytic activity can be ascribed to the introduction of the unique morphology of graphdiyne and the formation of the S-scheme heterojunction. The formation of the S-scheme heterojunction and improvement of photocatalytic activity were revealed by ultraviolet photoelectron spectroscopy, in-situ irradiation X-ray photoelectron spectroscopy, density functional theory calculations, electron paramagnetic resonance, and other basic characterization methods. This work offers insights into the preparation of morphologically tunable graphdiyne and the design and synthesis of efficient heterojunction photocatalysts.