SrTiO3: La/Cr hollow cube decorated with plasmonic Co for efficient photocatalytic hydrogen production

Plasmonic-driven photocatalyst have outstanding solar driven surface plasmon resonance (SPR) characteristics, and it is a prospective approach to improve photocatalytic performance. Herein, plasmonic Co metal decorated SrTiO 3 : La/Cr hollow cubes was developed and constructed by template-free hydrothermal method. The photocatalyst possesses the merits of the hollow structure with large specific surface area and strong light absorption. The intimate contact between Co and SrTiO 3 : La/Cr promotes the interfacial charge transfer. Co-SrTiO 3 : La/Cr manifests the superior photocatalytic performance toward water splitting for hydrogen evolution compared with that of other cocatalyst. And the H 2 evolution exceeds 210 μmol·g −1 ·h −1 under the optimum of the amount of 1.25wt% Co NPs. The mechanism of the enhanced performance comes from the improvement of light absorption in the visible-light region induced by SPR, as well as the efficient interfacial separation and transport of charge carriers on the photocatalyst facilitated by the local electromagnetic fields of plasmonic Co metal. Graphical Abstract