123rd General Meeting of the KCS

Type Symposium
Area Material Design and Applications for Artificial Photosynthesis
Room No. Room 405+406
Time FRI 14:30-14:55
Code MAT3-1
Subject Development of Stable Dye-sensitized Photoelectrosynthesis Cell (DSPEC) for Solar Fuel Production
Authors Kyung-Ryang Wee
Department of Applied Chemistry, Daegu University, Korea
Abstract We will introduce an artificial photosynthesis system for solar fuel production from the dye-sensitized photoelectrochemical cell (DSPEC), which is molecular level light absorption and oxidation or/and reduction catalyst approaches. In the DSPEC, the achievement of long-term stability in various pH conditions has long been a central goal of molecular-based solar energy conversion strategies. Here we describe an electrochemically polymerization procedure for preparing chromophore-catalyst assemblies on the nanoparticle metal oxide electrode surfaces for the long-term stable DSPEC system in various aqueous conditions, especially in high pH. Also, the electropolymerization strategy is a simple toolkit for preparing spatially controlled, multicomponent films and surface assemblies having both light harvesting chromophores and catalysts on the metal oxide electrodes. On the nanoparticle metal oxide films as a photoanode, excitation of the assembly with 1 sun (100 mW cm-2) illumination in phosphate buffer at pH 7~12 with an applied bias leads to water splitting in a DSPEC with a Pt cathode. Over multiple hour photolysis experiment in high pH condition, electrochemically prepared photoanode shows sustained water splitting with no significant photocurrent decrease. Instability of the surface bound chromophore in its oxidized state in the phosphate buffer leads to a gradual decrease in photocurrent and to the relatively modest faradaic efficiencies. These results indicate that the electropolymerized chromophore-catalyst assembly is a simple toolkit to make stable DSPEC system in various pH conditions for solar fuel production.
E-mail krwee@daegu.ac.kr