Photocatalytic H2O2 Generation over Microsphere Carbon-Assisted Hierarchical Indium Sulfide Nanoflakes via a Two-Step One-Electron Pathway.

The increasing demand for an alternative to traditional fuel has motivated intensive research and drawn more attention. H2O2 has emerged as an alternative due to its high capabilities, relatively safer nature as a fuel, and ease of transportation. The photocatalytic method is adopted to generate H2O2 using sustainable light energy to achieve an entire green system for a completely environmentally friendly process. Herein, the synthesized microsphere carbon-assisted hierarchical two-dimensional (2D) indium sulfide (In2S3) nanoflakes have been characterized thoroughly by various techniques such as X-ray diffraction (XRD), transmission electron microscope (TEM), X-ray photoelectron spectroscopy (XPS), diffuse reflectance spectra (DRS), photoluminescence (PL), and electron paramagnetic resonance (EPR). The photocatalytic performance of the In2S3-based photocatalysts can be promoted with the carbon layer assisting in facilitating the transfer of the photogenerated electrons and narrowing their band gaps. Optimized In2S3 successfully yielded 31.2 mM g-1 h-1 in the photocatalytic oxygen reduction reaction (ORR) process. Based on the results of different radical trapping experiments and different reaction conditions, the catalytic ORR process is proposed to be a two-step one-electron pathway.