Publication date: 15th December 2014
New photoelectrode materials based on ternary and quaternary metal oxides have attracted interest in recent years. Metal oxides systems, i.e. Fe-W-O, Bi-V-O or Fe-Cr-Al-O show promising properties, however, these materials have still to be significantly improved with respect to the limitation by slow water oxidation kinetics and poor charge separation. Thus, in order to achieve good performance from photoelectrochemical devices for solar water splitting the semiconducting absorber material has to be modified with an appropriate co-catalyst facilitating either the hydrogen evolution reaction (HER) in the case of p-type semiconductors or the oxygen eveolution reaction (OER) in the case of n-type semiconductors. Ir-, Rh-, or Ru-based catalysts cannot be used in economically viable devices, therefore alternative water oxidation catalysts based on earth-abundant materials such as Co, Fe, Mn have to be found. Combinatorial electrochemical deposition of different co-catalyst materials and subsequent photoelectrochemical characterization was performed using a specifically designed optical scanning droplet cell (OSDC) equipped with an automated electrolyte exchanging system. Electrochemical decoration of thin-film layers of a photoabsorber with co-catalyst using (photo)electrochemical deposition was performed while varying deposition parameters. Reproducible quantitative photoelectrochemical data was automatically recorded from these co-catalyst modified regions allowing to evaluate the impact of the co-catalyst deposition parameters on light-induced water splitting. Influence of the co-catalyst on the charge transfer resistance, spectral absorption and overall performance of the resulting photoelectrocatalytic devices was investigated for a large number of differently modified absorber materials.
Acknowledgement: The authors are grateful for financial support by the Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft in the framework of the SPP1613 (DFG SCHU/ 929 12-1)
nanoGe is a prestigious brand of successful science conferences that are developed along the year in different areas of the world since 2009. Our worldwide conferences cover cutting-edge materials topics like perovskite solar cells, photovoltaics, optoelectronics, solar fuel conversion, surface science, catalysis and two-dimensional materials, among many others.
Previously nanoGe Spring Meeting (NSM) and nanoGe Fall Meeting (NFM), MATSUS is a multiple symposia conference focused on a broad set of topics of advanced materials preparation, their fundamental properties, and their applications, in fields such as renewable energy, photovoltaics, lighting, semiconductor quantum dots, 2-D materials synthesis, charge carriers dynamics, microscopy and spectroscopy semiconductors fundamentals, etc.
International Conference on Hybrid and Organic Photovoltaics
International Conference on Hybrid and Organic Photovoltaics (HOPV) is celebrated yearly in May. The main topics are the development, function and modeling of materials and devices for hybrid and organic solar cells. The field is now dominated by perovskite solar cells but also other hybrid technologies, as organic solar cells, quantum dot solar cells, and dye-sensitized solar cells and their integration into devices for photoelectrochemical solar fuel production.
Asia-Pacific International Conference on Perovskite, Organic Photovoltaics and Optoelectronics
The main topics of the Asia-Pacific International Conference on Perovskite, Organic Photovoltaics and Optoelectronics (IPEROP) are discussed every year in Asia-Pacific for gathering the recent advances in the fields of material preparation, modeling and fabrication of perovskite and hybrid and organic materials. Photovoltaic devices are analyzed from fundamental physics and materials properties to a broad set of applications. The conference also covers the developments of perovskite optoelectronics, including light-emitting diodes, lasers, optical devices, nanophotonics, nonlinear optical properties, colloidal nanostructures, photophysics and light-matter coupling.
The International Conference on Perovskite Thin Film Photovoltaics Perovskite Photonics and Optoelectronics (NIPHO) is the best place to hear the latest developments in perovskite solar cells as well as on recent advances in the fields of perovskite light-emitting diodes, lasers, optical devices, nanophotonics, nonlinear optical properties, colloidal nanostructures, photophysics and light-matter coupling.