Layered‐Double‐Hydroxide Nanosheets as Efficient Visible‐Light‐Driven Photocatalysts for Dinitrogen Fixation
Abstract Semiconductor photocatalysis attracts widespread interest in water splitting, CO 2 reduction, and N 2 fixation. N 2 reduction to NH 3 is essential to the chemical industry and to the Earth's nitrogen cycle. Industrially, NH 3 is synthesized by the Haber–Bosch process under extreme conditions (400–500 °C, 200–250 bar), stimulating research into the development of sustainable technologies for NH 3 production. Herein, this study demonstrates that ultrathin layered‐double‐hydroxide (LDH) photocatalysts, in particular CuCr‐LDH nanosheets, possess remarkable photocatalytic activity for the photoreduction of N 2 to NH 3 in water at 25 °C under visible‐light irradiation. The excellent activity can be attributed to the severely distorted structure and compressive strain in the LDH nanosheets, which significantly enhances N 2 chemisorption and thereby promotes NH 3 formation.