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Rational design of photoelectrodes for photoelectrochemical water splitting and CO2 reduction

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Abstract

Solar energy has promising potential for building sustainable society. Conversion of solar energy into solar fuels plays a crucial role in overcoming the intermittent nature of the renewable energy source. A photoelectrochemical (PEC) cell that employs semiconductor as photoelectrode to split water into hydrogen or fixing carbon dioxide (CO2) into hydrocarbon fuels provides great potential to achieve zero-carbon-emission society. A proper design of these semiconductor photoelectrodes thus directly influences the performance of the PEC cell. In this review, we investigate the strategies that have been put towards the design of efficient photoelectrodes for PEC water splitting and CO2 reduction in recent years and provide some future design directions toward next-generation PEC cells for water splitting and CO2 reduction.

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Acknowledgements

The authors would like to acknowledge the funding support from U.S. National Science Foundation (NSF-CMMI-1663509).

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  1. Department of Mechanical Engineering, Iowa State University, Ames, IA, 50011, USA

    Yu Hui Lui, Bowei Zhang & Shan Hu

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  1. Yu Hui Lui
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Correspondence to Shan Hu.

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Lui, Y.H., Zhang, B. & Hu, S. Rational design of photoelectrodes for photoelectrochemical water splitting and CO2 reduction. Front. Phys. 14, 53402 (2019). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11467-019-0903-6

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