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Solar-driven photocatalytic water-splitting for H2 production holds great promise to alleviate the growing energy and environmental crisis. Nevertheless, it is still challenging up to now to develop noble-metal-free photocatalysts which are efficient for the H2 evolution reaction (HER). In this work, based on the ion-exchange and alloying reactions between Zn and Cd ions in liquids, a template-assisted ion-exchange strategy combined with subsequent electrostatic assembly process was employed to prepare uniform ZnS@CdS@Cd0.5Zn0.5S-MoS2 hollow nanospheres for the first time. Under visible-light irradiation (λ > 420 nm), the ZnS@CdS@Cd0.5Zn0.5S-MoS2 hybrid exhibits an optimal HER activity of 50.65 mmol h−1 g−1, which is 20 times more than that of its Pt-decorated ZnS@CdS@Cd0.5Zn0.5S counterpart and superior to that of most CdS-based photocatalysts ever reported. Moreover, the ZnS@CdS@Cd0.5Zn0.5S-MoS2 hybrid exhibits good stability for the long-term HER. The outstanding HER capability of ZnS@CdS@Cd0.5Zn0.5S-MoS2 could be attributed to the dramatically facilitated separation of charge carriers, abundant active sites from the defect-rich 1T/2H MoS2 few-layered nanosheets, and enhanced light-harvesting of the hollow nanostructure. The findings indicated here could benefit the exploitation of high-performance photocatalysts for promising solar-to-fuel applications. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Hydrogen evolution reaction (HER) via electrocatalysis using cost-efficient bimetallic phosphide as electrocatalyst holds a great promise for environmentally friendly energy technologies. Here we report a novel strategy to synthesize a series of CoNiP multi-shelled hollow microspheres with different ratios of Co to Ni using metal–organic framework as both the precursor and the template, and the as-obtained CoNiP-0.25 presents a pre-eminent electrocatalytic activity for the hydrogen evolution reaction (HER) in 1.0 M KOH. The CoNiP-0.25 microspheres are found to drive 20 mA cm−2 at a potential of 170 mV vs. RHE, which is 120 mV and 59 mV smaller than that of pure NiP and CoP, respectively. The outstanding HER activity of the CoNiP-0.25 microspheres can be attributed to the optimization of their electronic structure, the typical multi-shelled hollow structure and the massive exposure of the active phase bimetallic phosphide CoNiP. Moreover, the enhanced electrochemical stability of CoNiP electrocatalyst might also stem from its special structure of multi-shelled hollow microsphere, which inhibits its superficial oxidation during the catalytic process. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Correction for 'Designed synthesis of unique ZnS@CdS@Cd0.5Zn0.5S-MoS2 hollow nanospheres for efficient visible-light-driven H2 evolution' by Bowen Sun et al., CrystEngComm, 2020, 22, 2743–2755, DOI: 10.1039/D0CE00064G. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]