Photocatalytic hydrogen production: an overview of new advances in structural tuning strategies

Abstract

Hydrogen production from photocatalytic water decomposition provides a promising approach to harvest solar energy for addressing the challenges of energy shortage and environmental pollution. To meet the commercialization target set by the US Department of Energy, three great challenges of photocatalytic hydrogen production should be well addressed: the capture of solar light, the separation/transfer of photo-excited charge pairs and the surface redox reactions to produce useable fuels. The component, morphological and structural designs are highly promising solutions for solving these challenges. Among them, structural designs are more effective and easier; in particular, the incorporation of single atoms into the structure, defect control and formation of S-scheme heterojunctions has attracted considerable attention. The recent advancements in these topics are highlighted and discussed in this review.