CdS/VS2 Heterostructured Nanoparticles as Efficient Visible-Light-Driven Photocatalysts for Boosting Hydrogen Evolution

The development of highly active, cost-effective hydrogen-evolving photocatalysts is of great significance to alleviate the escalating environmental pollution and depleting fossil fuel sources. Herein, a novel CdS/VS2 heterostructured nanoparticle is successfully synthesized for the photocatalytic hydrogen evolution reaction (HER) under visible-light irradiation via a facile hydrothermal route. Experimental results demonstrate that VS2 can facilitate the absorption of visible light, enhance the electron transfer rate, as well as inhibit the recombination of photogenerated electron-hole pairs on CdS photocatalyst. Moreover, the optimal CdS/VS2 (0.2 wt.%) hybrid exhibits prominent photocatalytic HER activity 16 times higher than the pristine CdS counterpart, even outperforming the 1 wt.% platinum-loaded CdS. This work injects new impetus to explore efficient noble-metal-free cocatalysts of CdS photocatalyst for high-efficiency photocatalytic H-2 evolution.