A special coupling strategy: CuMoS as a large-sized co-catalyst for promoting photocatalytic hydrogen production performance.

The photocatalytic hydrogen production performance of semiconductor materials can be improved by co-catalyst modification. In most of the studies, the size of the co-catalyst is relatively small compared to the primary catalyst. However, in this study, we employed a novel strategy by synthesizing a relatively large-sized CuMoS as the co-catalyst and in situ loading smaller-sized ZnCdS onto CuMoS, verifying that CuMoS enhances the photocatalytic hydrogen production efficiency of ZnCdS. It can be observed by scanning electron microscopy (SEM) that the lateral size of 2D CuMoS is at least 50 times larger than the ZnCdS nanoparticle particle size. In addition, Density Functional Theory (DFT) calculations have demonstrated that the active site for hydrogen production in the composite is located in CuMoS. The large-sized of CuMoS not only provides more active sites but also broadens the electron transport channel, which is conducive to promoting the transfer of photogenerated electrons from ZnCdS. This work enriches the study of large-sized materials as co-catalyst and provides a strategy for the construction of composite catalysts.