Visible-light-driven hydrogen evolution using planarized conjugated polymer photocatalysts

Sprick, Reiner Sebastian and Bonillo, Baltasar and Clowes, Rob and Guiglion, Pierre and Brownbill, Nick J. and Slater, Benjamin J. and Blanc, Frédéric and Zwijnenburg, Martijn A. and Adams, Dave J. and Cooper, Andrew I. (2016) Visible-light-driven hydrogen evolution using planarized conjugated polymer photocatalysts. Angewandte Chemie - International Edition, 55 (5). pp. 1792-1796. ISSN 1433-7851 (https://doi.org/10.1002/anie.201510542)

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Abstract

Linear poly(p-phenylene)s are modestly active UV photocatalysts for hydrogen production in the presence of a sacrificial electron donor. Introduction of planarized fluorene, carbazole, dibenzo[b,d]thiophene or dibenzo[b,d]thiophene sulfone units greatly enhances the H2 evolution rate. The most active dibenzo[b,d]thiophene sulfone co-polymer has a UV photocatalytic activity that rivals TiO2, but is much more active under visible light. The dibenzo[b,d]thiophene sulfone co-polymer has an apparent quantum yield of 2.3 % at 420nm, as compared to 0.1 % for platinized commercial pristine carbon nitride.