Hole scavenger redox potentials determine quantum efficiency and stability of Pt-decorated CdS nanorods for photocatalytic hydrogen generation

Journal Article · Mon May 28 04:00:00 EDT 2012 · Applied Physics Letters

DOI:https://doi.org/10.1063/1.4723575· OSTI ID:22025577

Berr, Maximilian J; Wagner, Peter; Fischbach, Stefan; Schneider, Julian; Jaeckel, Frank; Feldmann, Jochen ^[1]; Vaneski, Aleksandar; Susha, Andrei S; Rogach, Andrey L ^[2]

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1. Department of Physics and Center for NanoScience (CeNS), Ludwig-Maximilians-Universitaet Muenchen, Amalienstr. 54, 80799 Muenchen (Germany)
2. Department of Physics and Materials Science and Center for Functional Photonics (CFP), City University of Hong Kong, Tat Chee Avenue, Kowloon (Hong Kong)

We use Pt-decorated CdS nanorods for photocatalytic hydrogen generation in the presence of sacrificial hole scavengers. Both the quantum efficiency for hydrogen generation and the stability of the colloidal nanocrystals in solution improve with increasing redox potential of the hole scavenger. The higher redox potential leads to faster hole scavenging, which increases quantum efficiency and stability since electron hole recombination and oxidation of the CdS become less important. The quantum efficiencies can be tuned over more than an order of magnitude. This finding is important for choosing hole scavengers and for comparing efficiencies and stabilities for different photocatalytic nanosystems.

• OSTI ID: 22025577
• Journal Information: Applied Physics Letters, Journal Name: Applied Physics Letters Journal Issue: 22 Vol. 100; ISSN APPLAB; ISSN 0003-6951
• Country of Publication: United States
• Language: English

Related Subjects

36 MATERIALS SCIENCE
77 NANOSCIENCE AND NANOTECHNOLOGY
CADMIUM SULFIDES
CRYSTALS
ELECTRONS
HOLES
HYDROGEN PRODUCTION
INTERSTITIAL HYDROGEN GENERATION
NANOSTRUCTURES
OXIDATION
PHOTOCATALYSIS
PLATINUM
QUANTUM EFFICIENCY
RECOMBINATION
REDOX POTENTIAL
SEMICONDUCTOR MATERIALS