Effect of Phosphorus-Doped Phase-Modulated WS₂ Nanosheets on CdS Nanorods for Highly Efficient Photocatalytic Hydrogen Production

The utilization of earth-abundant natural resources, such as solar energy, for photocatalytic hydrogen production offers a potential way to mitigate the impacts of fossil fuels. Here, we suggest the heterostructure formation of CdS nanorods with phosphorus-doped (P-doped) dual-phase WS 2 nanosheets (1T-2H), with the goal of exploring an extremely efficient photocatalyst for solar water splitting. 1T-2H-transformed WS 2 -P nanostructures exhibit a semimetallic nature with high electronic conductivity and are enriched with both basal and edge-active sites to promote charge carrier kinetics. This may drive the achievement of a high rate of hydrogen evolution by CdS/WS 2 -P nanostructures (262.12 mmol·g –1 ·h –1 ) emphasizing the synergistic interaction of CdS with dual-phase (1T-2H) WS 2 -P nanostructures. Furthermore, the stability analysis demonstrates that CdS/WS 2 -P nanostructures are extremely stable for more than 60 h under continuous solar irradiation, highlighting their large-scale applications. Overall, this work offers an example of how to overcome the efficiency barrier of a photocatalyst for solar hydrogen production via heterojunction creation of CdS with dual-phase WS 2 nanosheets.