Alexandria Digital Research Library

Hetero-structured nanomaterials for surface plasmonic photocatalysis

Author:
Liu, Deyu
Degree Grantor:
University of California, Santa Barbara. Chemistry
Degree Supervisor:
Galen D. Stucky
Place of Publication:
[Santa Barbara, Calif.]
Publisher:
University of California, Santa Barbara
Creation Date:
2015
Issued Date:
2015
Topics:
Materials science and Inorganic chemistry
Keywords:
Nanostructure
Photocatalysis
Surface plasmon resonance
Copper nanowire
Gold nanorod
Genres:
Online resources and Dissertations, Academic
Dissertation:
Ph.D.--University of California, Santa Barbara, 2015
Description:

The direct solar energy conversion to chemical energy based on the photo-production of electron--hole pairs with photocatalysts has been intensively studied in both academia and industry. To explore and design new higher efficiency schemes for the production of energetic charge carriers is one of the core methodologies for the development of high performance semiconductor-based photovoltaic and photocatalytic devices. Surface plasmonic solar energy conversion has been proposed as a promising alternative of conventional semiconductor-based systems. The new paradigm involves the generation of energetic electrons from the metallic nanostructures or the energy transfer with the highly enhanced local energy flux by the surface plasmons.

The very important feature of the surface plasmon resonance is that the wavelength of absorption is greatly dependent on the morphology of nanostructure. Thus it is possible to design plasmonic devices that can harvest photons over the entire solar spectrum without changing the chemical composition. This new strategy provides opportunities of developing new photocatalytic material/device with higher energy conversion efficiency, while keeping fabrication costs low. The strategy to realize this conception is by using a set of nanostructures that are rationally designed to track the solar spectrum. In this thesis, we demonstrate that such a combination can effectively improve the conversion efficiency by the panchromatic absorption. Furthermore, in the consideration of fabrication cost, a bottom-up strategy for the fabrication of the ordered Janus structure is developed using the molecular soft template to guide the proper assembly of different components. Beyond the fabrication cost, we put efforts to realize the surface plasmon photocatalysis with earth abundant materials. The chemically prepared uniform TiO2 coated copper nanowires exhibited excellent photocatalytic activities. Moreover, the activity has been found directly related with the surface plasmon copper metal rather than any copper oxides.

I believe this thesis work can inspire the material research community for the development of new surface plasmon photocatalyst, as well as new methods of the synthetic reactions for metal-semiconductor hetero-structured nanomaterials.

Physical Description:
1 online resource (192 pages)
Format:
Text
Collection(s):
UCSB electronic theses and dissertations
ARK:
ark:/48907/f3v1230w
ISBN:
9781339218571
Catalog System Number:
990045865690203776
Rights:
Inc.icon only.dark In Copyright
Copyright Holder:
Deyu Liu
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