Abstract
Both energy band and charge separation and transfer are the crucial affecting factor for a photochemical reaction. Herein, the BiOCl nanosheets without and with surface bismuth vacancy (BOC, V-BOC) are prepared by a simple hydrothermal method. It is found that the new surface defect states caused by bismuth vacancy have greatly up-shifted the valence band and efficiently enhanced the separation and transfer rates of photogenerated electron and hole. It is amazing that the photocatalytic activity of V-BOC is 13.6 times higher than that of BOC for the degradation methyl orange (MO). We can develop an efficient photocatalyst by the introduction of defects.