Publication date: 15th December 2025
The depletion of non-renewable energy resources has increased the demand for clean and sustainable energy technologies. Green hydrogen (H2) has garnered significant attention as it burns with zero CO2 emissions. Solar-driven photocatalytic water splitting to produce H2, offers a promising route for directly harnessing solar energy. In photocatalytic water splitting approach, the photogenerated electrons at semiconductor drive the hydrogen evolution reaction (HER), while holes are often utilised in unwanted oxidation of sacrificial electron donors. This leads to underutilization of oxidative potential of photogenerated holes. This can be circumvented by rationally designing semiconductors with appropriate band positions to selectively oxidise the cleverly chosen organic feedstock (biomass) into value-added products. This leads to effective utilisation of photogenerated electrons and holes.1,2
In this context, the present study discusses our approaches in obtaining bandgap tunable organic semiconductor, namely graphitic carbon nitride (g-C3N4, with enhanced visible-light absorption via two approaches such as heteroatom doping using environmentally friendly precursors and copolymerisation strategy with simple organic molecules. The used strategies resulted in awakening n→π* transition owing to the alteration of g-C3N4 lattice which helps in the enhanced visible light absorption.
The study also discusses the enhanced visible-light activity of modified C3N4 in the simultaneous production of H2 and high-value products from the oxidation of biomass-derived organic molecules (alcohols and amines). The modified C3N4 exhibited higher photocatalytic activity (3-4 fold increase in H2 production and 6 fold increase in oxidation product) than the pristine C3N4 with high selectivity and conversion of organic molecules into their respective products.
PhD Supervisor, Prof. Kiran Vankayala for constant guidance and support. SERB-DST and BITS Pilani K K Birla Goa campus for their financial assistance. CSIF, BITS Pilani, K K Birla, Goa campus for characterisation facilities.
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