Carbon Nitride Aerogels for the Photoredox Conversion of Water

Aerogel structures have attracted increasing research interest in energy storage and conversion owing to their unique structural features, and a variety of matters has been engineered into aerogels, including carbons, metal oxides, linear polymers and even metal chalcogenides. However, manufacturing of aerogels from nitride-based materials, particularly the emerging light-weight carbonitride (CN) is rarely reported. Here, we develop a facile method based on self-assembly chemistry to produce self-supported CN aerogels, without using any cross-linking agents. The combination of the large surface area, the incorporated functional group and the 3D network structure, endow the resulting freestanding aerogels with high photoreactiveity for hydrogen evolution and H2O2 production under visible light irradiation. This work presents a simple colloid chemistry strategy to construct 3D CN aerogel network that shows great potentials for solar to chemical conversion by artificial photosynthesis.