Operand observation of excited carrier transfers in photoelectrodes for water splitting by electrochemical XAFS

利用光电化学电池从水中制氢是一种极具吸引力的可再生能源。在发现本田-藤岛效应之后，已经建立了许多用于整体水分解的半导体光电极。近年来，金属氧化物如氧化锰或磷酸钴已被证明可以大大提高水分解的光电化学效率，因为半导体上的金属氧化物可以作为析氧助催化剂。因此，我们采用原位Mn - k边x射线吸收光谱技术，观察了光激发载流子在电化学反应过程中从Nb:SrTiO3光电极向金属氧化物助催化剂的转移。

Solar hydrogen production from water using photoelectrochemical cells is an attractive candidate for the renewable energy supply. Many semiconductor photoelectrodes for overall water splitting have already been established after the discovery of the Honda-Fujishima effect. Recently, metal oxides such as manganese oxide or cobalt phosphate have been demonstrated to substantially improve the photoelectrochemical efficiency for water splitting, because the metal oxides on the semiconductors can function as oxygen evolution cocatalyst. Therefore, we applied the in-situ Mn K-edge X-ray absorption spectroscopy technique for the observation of photoexcited carrier transfer from Nb:SrTiO3 photoelectrode to metal oxide cocatalysts during photoelectrochemical reaction.