Harnessing Near-Infrared Light for Highly Efficient Photocatalysis

Near-infrared (NIR) light, accounting for approximately 50 % of solar light, cannot directly excite photocatalytic reactions due to its lower energy, which severely restricts the photocatalytic solar energy conversion efficiency and hinders the application of photocatalysis. To overcome this dilemma, some viable strategies have been proposed to harness NIR light for enhancing photocatalytic performance based on material structure, composition, and function designs, and obvious progresses have been witnessed. In this review, the basic principles and representative advances in photocatalyst heterojunction designs (including p-n junctions, S-scheme, Z-scheme, and type-ІІ heterojunctions), photocatalyst composition and function designs (such as preparing rare earth element doped upconversion photocatalysts, rare earth upconversion photocatalytic hybrids and triplet-triplet annihilation upconversion photocatalytic composites), and photothermal-photocatalytic bifunction designs for NIR light utilization are exclusively scrutinized. Meanwhile, the applications of the above-mentioned NIR responsive photocatalyst composites in energy and environmental fields are summarized. Importantly, the challenges and outlooks in the field of NIR light harnessing for efficient photocatalysis are proposed, which may provide theoretical and experimental guidance to those working in solar energy conversion and utilization and other related fields.