High-performance natural-sunlight-driven Ag/AgCl photocatalysts with a cube-like morphology and blunt edges via a bola-type surfactant-assisted synthesis.

Ag/AgCl-based structures have recently been receiving considerable attention as visible-light-driven plasmonic photocatalysts, wherein the fabrication of Ag/AgCl species shaped with an anisotropic morphology is considered to be an efficient way to enhance their performances. While the past decade has witnessed great progress in this direction, it is still strongly desired to initiate a green and low-cost protocol for the synthesis of Ag/AgCl based structures with high catalytic activity. Using a surfactant-assisted synthesis protocol, wherein a cationic bola-type surfactant of chloride counteranions serves both as a reactant (namely, source of chlorine) for the generation of AgCl structures and as a directing template to assist the formation of anisotropic structures, we herein report that cube-like Ag/AgCl with blunt edges could be fabricated simply by dropping an aqueous solution of silver nitrate into an ethanol solution of the hexane-1,6-bis(trimethylammonium chloride) surfactant.

Sub-10 nm Ag Nanoparticles/Graphene Oxide: Controllable Synthesis, Size-Dependent and Extremely Ultrahigh Catalytic Activity.

While tremendous advancements in Ag nanoparticle (AgNP)-based materials have been made, the development of a facile protocol for preparing sub-10 nm AgNPs with controllable size and ultrahigh performance remains a formidable challenge. It is shown that AgNPs/graphene oxide (AgNPs/GO) bearing 2.5, 4.

Platinized spherical supramolecular nanoassemblies of a porphyrin: facile synthesis and excellent catalytic recyclability.

Porphyrin-based supramolecular nanoassemblies of a spherical morphology have been attracting broad interest owing to their wide application possibilities in numerous fields of paramount significance. Most of the existing assembly protocols, however, either suffer from the requirement of elaborately-designed yet tediously-synthesized ad hoc porphyrins, the use of surfactant templates, or accurate consideration of the experimental parameters etc. The initiation of a facile surfactant-free fabrication protocol performable under ambient conditions using commercial porphyrins as building blocks is strongly desired.

Shape-Controlled Metal-Free Catalysts: Facet-Sensitive Catalytic Activity Induced by the Arrangement Pattern of Noncovalent Supramolecular Chains.

Metal-free catalytic materials have recently received broad attention as promising alternatives to metal-involved catalysts. This is owing to their inherent capability to overcome the inevitable limitations of metal-involved catalysts, such as high sensitivity to poisoning, the limited reserves, high cost and scarcity of metals (especially noble metals), etc. However, the lack of shape-controlled metal-free catalysts with well-defined facets is a formidable bottleneck limiting our understandings on the underlying structure-activity relationship at atomic/molecular level, which thereby restrains their rational design.

Sheet-like and truncated-dodecahedron-like AgI structures via a surfactant-assisted protocol and their morphology-dependent photocatalytic performance.

Silver halide-based structures have been attracting great interest as efficient visible-light-driven photocatalysts towards the photodegradation of organic pollutants, and those studies focusing on their morphology-dependent catalytic performances have received particular attention. While great advancements in this regard have been witnessed in the past few years with respect to AgCl- and AgBr-based photocatalysts, relevant explorations concerning AgI-based species are relatively rare, even though the excellent durability of AgI-based structures renders them attractive candidates for potential photocatalytic uses. By means of chemical reactions between AgNO and tetramethylammonium iodide (TMAI), and AgNO and tetrabutylammonium iodide (TBAI), we herein report that AgI structures with a sheet-like and a truncated-dodecahedron-like morphology, respectively, could be controllably synthesized via a surfactant-assisted fabrication protocol.