Warm congratulations to Dr. Shaoquan Li and Dr. Zixian Li from the research group for publishing an article titled "Photocatalytic CO₂ Reduction by Near Infrared Light (1200 nm) Irradiation and a Ruthenium Intercalated NiAl Layered Double Hydration" in the internationally renowned journal "Angelwandte Chemie International Edition".

In response to the current problem of insufficient utilization of infrared light in the field of photocatalytic carbon dioxide reduction, this article designs a photocatalyst that can utilize low-energy near-infrared light and successfully achieves carbon dioxide reduction driven by near-infrared light at a wavelength of 1200 nm. The article presents a novel near-infrared optical driven photocatalyst composed of anionic ruthenium based complexes intercalated between nickel aluminum layered double hydroxide nanosheets (NiAl-Lu-LDH). The catalyst exhibits efficient carbon dioxide photoreduction performance (0.887 μ mol h-1) under 1200 nm illumination, with a carbon monoxide selectivity of 84.81%, and excellent stability over 50 test cycles. This significant performance is attributed to the reduction of the band gap (0.98 eV) of LDH by the charge redistribution phenomenon related to compression in the intercalated ruthenium complex. In addition, transient absorption spectroscopy data validated the photo induced electron transfer of ruthenium complexes to LDH laminates, enhancing the electron transfer process required to drive CO₂PR. The hydroxyl defects present in the LDH laminates promote the adsorption of carbon dioxide molecules and reduce the energy barrier required for NIR-CO₂PR to generate CO. This is the first report of NIR-CO₂PR with a wavelength of up to 1200 nm in an LDH based photocatalyst system.

Schematic diagram of photocatalytic CO₂ reduction to CO on NiAl-Ru-LDH under near-infrared light (1200 nm)