Rational design 2D/3D MoS2/In2O3 composites for great boosting photocatalytic H2 production coupled with dye degradation

Background: Currently, the solar-driven photocatalytic H2 evolution coupled with pollutants photodegradation is a promising strategy for the developing sustainable solar energy and environmental processes. Thus, development of the high-efficiency, robust, and low-cost photocatalysts for photocatalytic H2 production combined with pollutants photodegradation in a one-pot system is urgently needed.Methods: In this study, the two-dimension (2D) thin-layered molybdenum disulfide (MoS2) was decorated on the surface of three-dimension (3D) cube-like indium oxide (In2O3) to forming the new 2D/3D MoS2/In2O3 composites by a hydrothermal method. The photoreactivities of as-obtained MoS2/In2O3 composites were carefully studied by the photocatalytic H2 generation coupled with dye (Rhodamine B, RhB) degradation.Significant findings: The photocatalysis results suggested that all of the as-formed composites could greatly boost photocatalytic H2 production simultaneous with RhB degradation performance with respect to pristine In2O3. Moreover, it was found that the 10 wt% MoS2 content of sample (10-MoS2/In2O3) showed the optimum activities both in H2 generation and RhB photodegradation under simulated sunlight irradiation. The H2 evolved rate of 10-MoS2/In2O3 was 15.5 mu mol/g/h, which was 77.5 times higher than that of pure In2O3. Meanwhile, The RhB photodegraded efficiency of 10-MoS2/In2O3 could achieve nearly 100%, and the total organic carbon (TOC) removal rate was 12.1-folds greater than that of single In2O3. Eventually, the charge carrier's transferring from In2O3 photocatalyst to MoS2 co-catalyst was evidenced by density functional theory (DFT) calculations, and further a dramatical improvement of photocatalytic mechanism was proposed.