Mingyang Li

Remarkable photoelectrochemical performance of carbon dots sensitized TiO2 under visible light irradiation

Carbon dots (CDs) sensitized TiO2 was synthesised for water splitting. The resultant photoanode showed an activity that was five times higher than that of TiO2 under the visible light irradiation, which results from the CDs having strong absorption ability under the visible light irradiation.

Improving the photoelectrochemical and photocatalytic performance of CdO nanorods with CdS decoration

Herein, we report an effective and simple strategy to greatly improve the photoactivity of CdO nanorods (NRs) by decorating them with CdS. The CdO–CdS heterostructured NRs grown on a FTO substrate exhibited substantially higher visible-light-driven photoactivity for a PEC cell and the degradation of methylene blue (MB) solution compared to CdO NRs.

CdS/CeOx heterostructured nanowires for photocatalytic hydrogen production

Herein, heterostructured CdS/CeOx nanowires were synthesized by a facile two-step electrochemical process and exhibited good performance in photocatalytic hydrogen production. These CdS/CeOx nanowires showed a hydrogen evolution rate of 1290.5 μmol g−1 h−1 under white light irradiation and 473.6 μmol g−1 h−1 under visible light irradiation.

Electrochemical synthesis of CoFe2O4 porous nanosheets for visible light driven photoelectrochemical applications

CoFe2O4 porous nanosheets (CFOPNSs) on F-doped SnO2 coated glass (FTO) substrates with 30.5 nm average pore diameter were prepared through a template-free electrochemical method from aqueous solution. The CFOPNSs exhibit obvious absorption in the visible-near infrared light range, and obvious photocurrent responses under visible light illumination (λ ≥ 390 nm). Additionally, XPS and Raman results indicate that the valence band maximum (VBM) of the CFOPNSs occurs at the Co 3d level.

Controllable electrochemical synthesis of CoFe2O4 nanostructures on FTO substrate and their magnetic properties

CoFe2O4 nanosheets (NSs) and nanoparticles (NPs) were successfully synthesized on F-doped SnO2 coated glass (FTO) substrate via a facile and controllable electrodeposition method. X-Ray photoelectron spectroscopy (XPS) results indicated that the CoFe2O4 NSs and NPs have different distributions of Co and Fe cations over tetrahedral and octahedral sites. The magnetic measurements showed that the prepared CoFe2O4 NSs exhibit higher value of magnetic properties, which can be mainly ascribed to the variation of the cation distribution.

Amorphous NiO electrocatalyst overcoated ZnO nanorod photoanodes for enhanced photoelectrochemical performance

Developing high-performance photoanodes is essential for practical applications of photoelectrochemical (PEC) water splitting. In this work, we demonstrated that introducing amorphous NiO electrocatalysts onto the surface of ZnO nanorod (NR) photoanodes can largely improve their PEC performance. The NiO/ZnO core–shell NR arrays were obtained by two step electrodepositions and annealing. The amorphous NiO nanosheet electrocatalyst shell on a single crystalline ZnO NR semiconductor core formed a composite photoanode configuration for PEC water splitting. The NiO/ZnO photoanode yielded a remarkable 260 mV cathodic shift in the onset potential for water oxidation compared to the bare ZnO photoanode. And the highest PEC efficiency of the NiO/ZnO photoanode was found to be 1.81%, which is 30 times higher than that of the ZnO photoanode (0.06%). This research demonstrates that introducing amorphous NiO electrocatalysts can largely improve the PEC performance of ZnO photoanodes.