Confined Heterojunction in Hollow-Structured TiO<sub>2</sub> and Its Directed Effect in Photodriven Seawater Splitting.
basic_science · Level V
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- Record sourced from PubMed, PMID 37668497.
- Also identified by DOI 10.1021/acsnano.3c05174.
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Abstract
The high salinity of seawater often strongly affects the activity and stability of photocatalysts utilized for photodriven seawater splitting. The current investigation is focused on the photocatalyst H-TiO<sub>2</sub>/Cu<sub>2</sub>O, comprised of hydroxyl-enriched hollow mesoporous TiO<sub>2</sub> microspheres containing incorporated Cu<sub>2</sub>O nanoparticles. The design of H-TiO<sub>2</sub>/Cu<sub>2</sub>O is based on the hypothesis that the respective hollow and mesoporous structure and hydrophilic surfaces of TiO<sub>2</sub> microspheres would stabilize Cu<sub>2</sub>O nanoparticles in seawater and provide efficient and selective proton adsorption. H-TiO<sub>2</sub>/Cu<sub>2</sub>O shows hydrogen production performances of 45.7 mmol/(g·h) in simulated seawater and 17.9 mmol/(g·h) in natural seawater, respectively. An apparent quantum yield (AQY) in hydrogen production of 18.8% in water (and 14.9% in natural seawater) was obtained at 365 nm. Moreover, H-TiO<sub>2</sub>/Cu<sub>2</sub>O displays high stability and can maintain more than 90% hydrogen evolution activity in natural seawater for 30 h. A direct mass- and energy- transfer mechanism is proposed to clarify the superior performance of H-TiO<sub>2</sub>/Cu<sub>2</sub>O in seawater splitting.