Abstract
Photoelectorchemical (PEC) water splitting is an attractive approach for producing sustainable and environment- friendly hydrogen. An efficient PEC process is rooted in appropriate semiconductor materials, which should possess small bandgap to ensure wide light harvest, facile charge separation to allow the generated photocharges migrating to the reactive sites and highly catalytic capability to fully utilize the separated photocharges. Proper electrode fabrication method is of equal importance for promoting charge transfer and accelerating surface reactions in the electrodes. Moreover, powerful characterization method can shed light on the complex PEC process and provide deep understanding of the rate-determining step for us to improve the PEC systems further. Targeting on high solar conversion efficiency, here we provide a review on the development of PEC water splitting in the aspect of materials exploring, fabrication method and characterization. It is expected to provide some fundamental insight of PEC and inspire the design of more effective PEC systems.
摘要
光电催化分解水作为一种清洁可持续获取氢能的技术吸引了人们的广泛关注. 高效光电过程有赖于选择合适的半导体材料, 即: 具 有较小的带隙以保障足够的光吸收; 优异的电荷分离以保障光生电荷向反应位点的迁移; 高效的表面催化能力以实现对光生电荷的充分 利用. 同时, 合理的电极组装方法对于电荷的迁移与表面反应也起到至关重要的作用. 进一步, 强有力的表征技术为深入了解光电催化分 解水的过程, 认清反应限速步骤并据此进一步优化电极设计提供了保证和依据. 本文着眼于实现高效的光催化分解水制氢过程, 综述了电 极材料的开发, 电极组装手段和光电催化表征技术这三个方面的研究进展, 并期望为发展更加高效的光电催化分解水过程提供指导.
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Acknowledgements
This work is supported by the Australian Research Council through its Discovery Project (DP) and Federation Fel-lowship (FF) Program. The Queensland node of the Australian National Fabrication Facility (ANFF) is also appreciated.
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Zhiliang Wang received his PhD degree (supervised by Prof. Can Li) in physical chemistry from Dalian Institute of Chemical Physics (DICP), Chinese Academy of Sciences in 2017 and now he works in Prof. Wang’s group as a postdoctoral fellow at The University of Queensland (UQ), Australia. His current research focuses on photoelectrochemical solar energy conversion.
Lianzhou Wang is a professor at the School of Chemical Engineering and the director of Nanomaterials Center, UQ, Australia. He received his PhD degree from the Chinese Academy of Sciences in 1999. Before joining UQ in 2004, he worked at two National Institutes (NIMS and AIST) of Japan for five years. Wang’s research interests mainly focus on the design and application of semiconducting nanomaterials in renewable energy conversion/storage systems, including photocatalysis, solar cell, rechargable batteries and so on.
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Wang, Z., Wang, L. Photoelectrode for water splitting: Materials, fabrication and characterization. Sci. China Mater. 61, 806–821 (2018). https://doi.org/10.1007/s40843-018-9240-y
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s40843-018-9240-y