Bio‐Metabolism‐Driven Crystalline‐Engineering of CdS Quantum Dots for Highly Active Photocatalytic H2 Evolution

• Published in: ChemistrySelect (Weinheim) Vol. 6; no. 15; pp. 3702 - 3706
• Main Authors: Xu, Li‐Xia, Wang, Yan‐Zhai, Zhou, Dao, Chen, Meng‐Yuan, Yang, Xue‐Jin, Ye, Xiao‐Mei, Yong, Yang‐Chun
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: English
• Published: 22.04.2021
• Subjects: Biosynthesis; Crystalline engineering; Hydrogen; Photocatalysis; Quantum dots
• ISSN: 2365-6549; 2365-6549
• DOI: 10.1002/slct.202100591

Biosynthesis was considered as a green and sustainable approach for nanomaterials fabrication. However, it is still quite challenging to fine tune the biosynthesis process for high‐quality photocatalytic nanomaterials. In this study, an aerobic approach for biosynthesis of photocatalytic CdS quantum dots (QDs) by Shewanella oneidensis MR‐1 was developed. Interestingly, it was found that by simply tuning the concentration of substrates, the crystalline structure of the CdS QDs was transformed between cubic phase and hexagonal phase. The hexagonal CdS QDs synthesized by simple substrate‐metabolism regulation exhibited high photocatalytic H2 evolution activity (21 mmol H2/g CdS/h), which was the highest record for CdS QDs. This finding demonstrated the possibility to well control the crystalline structure of biosynthesized QDs by simple bio‐metabolism regulation and provided a bio‐metabolism‐driven green route for crystalline engineering. Bio‐metabolism‐driven crystalline transformation of CdS quantum dots (QDs) by bacterial cell was explored and the biosynthesis of highly active hexagonal CdS QDs was achieved, which exhibited high photocatalytic H2 evolution rate.