Zinc cadmium sulfide nanocrystals prepared in PAM water-soluble nanoreactors and their photocatalytic performance in photodegradation

The Zn x Cd 1–x S nanocrystals with different Zn 2+ /Cd 2+ ratios were solvothermally incubated in water-soluble nanoreactors formed by inverse miniemulsion. Notably, Zn 0.5 Cd 0.5 S nanocrystals with larger grain sizes were obtained from polyacrylamide (PAM) nanoreactors, where the PAM solution served as a key component for precursor ripening. The miniemulsion-derived nanoreactors remained stable during nanocrystal incubation, with a size of approximately 160 nm. The obtained Zn x Cd 1-x S nanocrystals exhibited a cubic structure, and their band gap ( E g ) was tunable from 3.83 eV ( x = 1) to 2.64 eV ( x = 0). The catalytic performance of the nanocrystals was optimized by adjusting both the Zn 2+ /Cd 2+ ratio and the PAM concentration in the nanoreactors. Specifically, Zn 0.5 Cd 0.5 S nanocrystals incubated in nanoreactors containing 10.0 mg g –1 PAM achieved an enhanced grain size of 15 nm, displaying a tunable band gap of 2.58 eV and a weaker luminescence intensity. These nanocrystals exhibited the best catalytic degradation efficiency by balancing the light absorption and the photogenerated charge redox ability, thereby providing a selective strategy for the design of the advanced semiconductor materials.