Journal Home > Volume 15 , Issue 12

Faced with the growing consumption of fossil fuels and the consequent energy/ecological crisis, photocatalysis has become a realistic option to develop new energy source and realize the carbon neutrality. Heterojunction photocatalysts constructed by multiple semiconductors with staggered band structure can spatially separate redox reaction sites to realize synergistic oxidation and reduction reactions, and have captured broad interest. However, the undesigned heterojunctions still encounter some headache difficulties, that is the poor interfacial contact, which will block carrier mobility, thus result in inefficient and instable catalysts. Recently, researchers have been focusing on constructing chemical bonds (especially covalent bonding) between different semiconductors to induce the formation of intimate and stable interface contact. Herein, this review article presents the state-of-the-art progress on interfacial chemical bonds (ICB) in heterojunction photocatalysts and clarifies the function mechanism for enhancing photocatalysis. Given that the formation of ICB strongly depends on the surface characteristics of semiconductors, we clarify the formation mechanism and put forward rational design strategies. More importantly, the current photocatalytic applications of ICB are reviewed to have a deep understanding of structure–activity related mechanisms. Finally, our brief outlooks on the current challenges and future development trends of ICB for next-generation photocatalysts are pointed out to create brand-new strategies for optimizing photocatalytic properties and accelerate the practical applications of ICB with high-performance.

Publication history
Copyright
Acknowledgements

Publication history

Received: 27 March 2022
Revised: 26 May 2022
Accepted: 28 May 2022
Published: 11 July 2022
Issue date: December 2022

Copyright

© Tsinghua University Press 2022

Acknowledgements

Acknowledgements

The authors gratefully acknowledge the financial support by the National Natural Science Foundation of China (Nos. 22076082 and 22006029), the Frontiers Science Center for New Organic Matter (No. 6318120), the Science and Technology Research Projects of Colleges and Universities in Hebei Province (No. ZD2020149), and the Tianjin Commission of Science and Technology as key technologies R&D projects (No. 21YFSNSN00250).

Return