Journal
JOURNAL OF MATERIALS CHEMISTRY A
Volume 2, Issue 19, Pages 6727-6733Publisher
ROYAL SOC CHEMISTRY
DOI: 10.1039/c4ta00729h
Keywords
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Funding
- National Basic Research Development Program of China [2010CB934500, 2012CB825800]
- National Natural Science Foundation of China [11275137, 11179032, 91333112]
- Priority Academic Program Development of Jiangsu Higher Education Institutions (PAPD)
- Fund for Innovative Research Teams of Jiangsu Higher Education Institutions
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Hydrogen-treated hematite nanostructures were prepared by a simple pyrolysis of NaBH4 in a crucible. The H-2-treated hematite photoelectrode showed high efficiency for solar water oxidation with a photocurrent of 2.28 mA cm(-2) at 1.23 V vs. RHE, which was over 2.5 times higher than that for pristine hematite (0.88 mA cm(-2)). The significant improvement of the photocurrent can be attributed to increased oxygen vacancies after the H-2 treatment. Moreover, the onset potential for H-2-treated hematite was low and when compared to the hematite photoelectrode treated in an oxygen-deficient atmosphere to produce oxygen vacancies, a cathodic shift of the onset potential was observed by about 120 mV (from 0.99 to 0.87 V vs. RHE). The cathodic shift of the onset potential was attributed to the surface effect of H2 treatment while the oxygen-deficiency treatment mainly affected the bulk, which was confirmed by X-ray absorption spectroscopy. The results also suggest that the presence of surface defect states of Fe2+ in hematite is not the reason for high onset potential described in the literature. The H-2-treated hematite with high efficiency could be used as a good starting material to achieve better performance for practical applications with further modifications such as surface catalysts or elemental doping.
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