Au/Pt Nanoparticle-Decorated TiO2 Nanofibers with Plasmon-Enhanced Photocatalytic Activities for Solar-to-Fuel Conversion

We present the fabrication of TiO2 nanofibers codecorated with Au and Pt nanoparticles through facile electrospinning. The Au and Pt nanoparticles with sizes of 5-12 nm are well-dispersed in the TiO2 nanofibers as evidenced by electron microscopic analyses. The present design of Au/Pt codecoration in the TiO2 nanofibers leads to remarkably enhanced photocatalytic activities on both hydrogen generation and CO2 reduction. This great enhancement is attributed to the synergy of electron-sink function of Pt and surface plasmon resonance (SPR) of Au nanoparticles, which significantly improves charge separation of photoexcited TiO2. Our studies demonstrate that through rational design of composite nanostructures one can harvest visible light through the SPR effect to enhance the photocatalytic activities of semiconductors initiated by UV-light to more effectively utilize the whole solar spectrum for energy conversion.