The interest in using carbon nitrides (CN) for CO 2 conversion has stimulated extensive research on CN synthesis. Herein, we report the synthesis of two novel CN materials using low-cost commercially available precursors at low temperatures in a short duration of time. Two CN materials, one derived from 5-amino tetrazole (named 4NZ-CN) and the other derived from 3, 5-diamino-1, 2, 4-triazole (named 3NZ-CN) precursors, are prepared by refluxing these precursors for 2 h at 100 °C. 4NZ-CN and 3NZ-CN catalysts show higher surface areas (55.80 and 52.00 m 2 g -1 ) and more basic sites (10.05 and 5.65 mmol g -1 ) than the conventional graphitic carbon nitride (g-C 3 N 4 ) derived from melamine, for which the corresponding values are 9.20 m 2 g -1 and 0.62 mmol g -1 , respectively. In addition, both CN exhibit a 3-fold higher catalytic activity for CO 2 cycloaddition to epoxides than g-C 3 N 4 . The structure-activity relationship was ascertained using a combination of experimental and computational studies, and a catalytic mechanism was proposed. This work provides a facile strategy for the synthesis of novel CN materials at relatively low temperatures, and the developed catalysts show remarkable performance in the conversion of CO 2 to value-added chemicals.
Competing Interests: Declaration of competing interest The authors declare that they have no known competing financial interests or personal relationships that could have appeared to influence the work reported in this paper.
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