Confinement Aided Simultanous Water Cleaning and Energy Harvesting Using Atomically Thin Wurtzite (Wurtzene)

Syntheses of few-layered piezocatalysts from nonlayered materials have gained a huge attention of attention in recent years due to their potential applicability in efficient removal of toxic elements from water. Here, a simple scalable bottom up approach consisting of wet-chemical synthesis method is used to produce the atomically thin (2D)-wurtzite ZnO: wurtzene. The presence of a large number of well-distributed surface defects in the synthesized wurtzene promotes the separation of charge carriers in it via the excellent piezo-photocatalytic activity and thereby the efficiency of degradation of a test dye (namely methylene blue) is enhanced by approximate to 5 times. By taking an innovative approach, a piezoelectric driven power cell is also fabricated by using the wurtzene and the highest open circuit voltage is found out to be approximate to 40 V at 1.0 kPa of applied periodic pressure. The experimental observations are explained with density functional theory calculation. The confinement effect due to reduced dimension plays a crucial role in the wurtzene's excellent piezoelectric response. It is envisioned that the present findings will provided a clear insight into the synthesis of wurtzene with surface defects for highly efficient sunlight driven photocatalytic activity as well as piezoelectric energy harvesting.

Automated summary

Recent attention has been focused on synthesizing few-layered piezocatalysts from nonlayered materials, with potential applicability in efficient removal of toxic elements from water. Through a wet-chemical synthesis method, atomically thin wurtzite ZnO was produced, enhancing catalytic activity and enabling fabrication of a piezoelectric power cell. The presence of well-distributed surface defects in the synthesized wurtzite promotes excellent piezo-photocatalytic activity and efficiency in degrading a test dye.