Hierarchically porous hydrangea-like In₂S₃/In₂O₃ heterostructures for enhanced photocatalytic hydrogen evolution

Semiconductor-based photocatalytic hydrogen evolution is considered to be a promising and cost-effective approach to address the environmental issues and energy crisis. It still remains a great challenge to design highly-efficient semiconductor photocatalysts via a facile method. Herein, hierarchically porous hydrangea-like In₂S₃/In₂O₃ heterostructures are successfully synthesized via a simple in situ oxidization process. The formed In₂S₃/In₂O₃ heterostructures exhibit superior photocatalytic activity to the counterpart In₂S₃ and In₂O₃. The boosted photocatalytic performance is ascribed to the formed heterostructures, which greatly facilitate the interfacial charge transfer. Moreover, the formation of hierarchically porous heterostructures increases the number of active sites and improves the permeability, and thus significantly promotes the photocatalytic H₂ evolution activity. This work may provide a new insight for designing In₂S₃-based heterostructures for efficient solar light conversion.