Type-II Heterojunction CdIn₂S₄/BiVO₄ Coupling with CQDs to Improve PEC Water Splitting Performance Synergistically

Abstract

Bismuth vanadate (BiVO4) has been considered as a promising photoelectrocatalytic (PEC) semiconductor, but suffers from severe hole recombination, attributed to the short hole-diffusion length and the low carrier mobility. Herein, a type-II heterojunction CdIn2S4/BiVO4 is designed to improve the photocurrent density from 1.22 (pristine BiVO4) to 2.68 mA cm–2 at 1.23 V vs the reversible hydrogen electrode (RHE), accelerating the bulk separation of photogenerated carriers by the built-in field from the matched energy band. With the introduction of CQDs, CQDs/CdIn2S4/BiVO4 increases the photocurrent density to 4.84 mA cm–2, enhancing the light absorption and cathodically shifting its onset potential, due to the synergetic effect of the heterojunction and CQDs. Compared with BiVO4, CQDs/CdIn2S4/BiVO4 promotes the bulk separation efficiency to 94.6% and the surface injection efficiency to 72.2%. Additionally, spin-coating of FeOOH on CQDs/CdIn2S4/BiVO4 could further improve the PEC performance and keep a long stability for water splitting. The density function theory (DFT) calculations illustrated that the type-II heterojunction CdIn2S4/BiVO4 could decrease the oxygen evolution reaction (OER) overpotential and accelerate bulk charge separation for the built-in field of the aligned band structure.