Direct converting of CO₂ to valuable fuels via solar-powered photoreduction is a promising “green chemistry” route. The key issue for this approach is the exploitation of low-cost and high-efficiency photocatalysts. Here, a novel nanoflakelet-constructed nitrogen-doped CeO₂ with relatively ordered mesostructure (NMCe) is prepared through a facile and cheap urea-assisted template method. In comparison with nanocasted ordered mesoporous CeO₂ (OMCe) with the similar textural properties, the NMCe shows improved CO₂ adsorption ability and has lowered band gap energy, higher surface Ce³⁺ concentration and more surface oxygen vacancies. Owing to these characteristics, the NMCe exhibits considerably enhanced photocatalytic performance for visible-light-driven reduction of CO₂, where the yields of CO and CH₄ are 2.5-fold higher than those on OMCe.

通过太阳能光还原将CO ₂直接转化为有价值的燃料是一种有前途的“绿色化学”路线。这种方法的关键问题是开发低成本和高效的光催化剂。在此，通过一种简便而廉价的尿素辅助模板法制备了一种具有相对有序介观结构（NMCe）的新型纳米片状氮掺杂CeO ₂。与具有相似织构性质的纳米浇铸有序介孔CeO ₂（OMCe）相比，NMCe显示出提高的CO ₂吸附能力并降低了带隙能，具有更高的表面Ce ³⁺浓度和更多的表面氧空位。由于这些特性，NMCe对可见光驱动的CO ₂还原具有显着增强的光催化性能，其中CO和CH ₄的产率比OMCe高2.5倍。