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Photoelectrolysis Using Type-II Semiconductor Heterojunctions.

ABSTRACT: The solar-powered production of hydrogen for use as a renewable fuel is highly desirable for the world's future energy infrastructure. However, difficulties in achieving reasonable efficiencies, and thus cost-effectiveness, have hampered significant research progress. Here we propose the use of semiconductor nanostructures to create a type-II heterojunction at the semiconductor-water interface in a photoelectrochemical cell (PEC) and theoretically investigate it as a method of increasing the maximum photovoltage such a cell can generate under illumination, with the aim of increasing the overall cell efficiency. A model for the semiconductor electrode in a PEC is created, which solves the Schrödinger, Poisson and drift-diffusion equations self-consistently. From this, it is determined that ZnO quantum dots on bulk n-InGaN with low In content x is the most desirable system, having electron-accepting and -donating states straddling the oxygen- and hydrogen-production potentials for x?

SUBMITTER: Harrison S

PROVIDER: S-EPMC5599583 | biostudies-literature | 2017 Sep

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature

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Photoelectrolysis Using Type-II Semiconductor Heterojunctions.

Harrison S S Hayne M M

Scientific reports 20170914 1

The solar-powered production of hydrogen for use as a renewable fuel is highly desirable for the world's future energy infrastructure. However, difficulties in achieving reasonable efficiencies, and thus cost-effectiveness, have hampered significant research progress. Here we propose the use of semiconductor nanostructures to create a type-II heterojunction at the semiconductor-water interface in a photoelectrochemical cell (PEC) and theoretically investigate it as a method of increasing the max ...[more]

PMID: 28912457

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