An efficient visible-light photocatalyst made from a nonpolar layered semiconductor by grafting electron-withdrawing organic molecules to its surface.

A nonpolar inorganic layered semiconductor becomes an efficient visible-light photocatalyst when its surface layer becomes polar by chemically attaching electron-withdrawing 4-substituted thiophenolates -S-C6H4Z (Z = NO2, COOH, Cl, Br, H, CH3, NH2) via Bi-S bonds. An in-depth study finds a correlation between the apparent rate constant (kapp) and the Hammett constants σpara of the 4-substituted groups.