Long-term durability of metastable β-Fe<sub>2</sub>O<sub>3</sub> photoanodes in highly corrosive seawater.
basic_science · Level V
Where this comes from
- Record sourced from PubMed, PMID 37460538.
- Also identified by DOI 10.1038/s41467-023-40010-9 and PMC identifier 10352262.
- Licence recorded as CC BY.
- The licence permits redistribution, so the abstract is shown in full and the full text is available from the publisher.
Abstract
Durability is one prerequisite for material application. Photoelectrochemical decomposition of seawater is a promising approach to produce clean hydrogen by using solar energy, but it always faces the problem of serious Cl<sup>-</sup> corrosion. We find that the main deactivation mechanism of the photoanode is oxide surface reconstruction accompanied by the coordination of Cl<sup>-</sup> during seawater splitting, and the stability of the photoanode can be effectively improved by enhancing the metal-oxygen interaction. Taking the metastable β-Fe<sub>2</sub>O<sub>3</sub> photoanode as an example, Sn added to the lattice can enhance the M-O bonding energy and hinder the transfer of protons to lattice oxygen, thereby inhibiting excessive surface hydration and Cl<sup>-</sup> coordination. Therefore, the bare Sn/β-Fe<sub>2</sub>O<sub>3</sub> photoanode delivers a record durability for photoelectrochemical seawater splitting over 3000 h.