M.Sc. project
2012-13
Artificial Photosynthesis: Solar-to-Fuel Energy Conversion with Cu2O
Photocathodes
The world energy supply today is dominated by fossil fuels which are not only in limited
supply, but also produce harmful by-products which pollute the environment and are toxic to all life
on earth. Therefore a clean, renewable, and abundant source of energy is required to fuel the growing
population of the world using earth abundant materials. One such solution to this problem is through
the direct conversion of solar energy into fuels which can be stored and used on-demand, similar to the
way plants convert and store energy in photosynthesis.
The prime materials that are used for solar-tofuel production are metal oxides due to their
advantageous optical and electronic properties. Among
metal oxides, cuprous oxide (Cu2O) has an ideal band
gap energy to absorb visible light from the sun, and
excellent charge transport properties. In fact, the
highest recorded photo-current generation for metal
oxides has been reported for Cu2O, showing that it has
promising potential for real world applications.
However, the biggest draw-back to using Cu2O is that
the material easily reduces to copper on the surface
during photoreactions.
The aim of this project is to fabricate
robust and highly active Cu2O nanostructures
which can then be passivated by the addition of
transparent conducting layers. This approach can
utilize the high solar activity of Cu2O and
functionalize this material through surface
passivation. The applications of this project will
include (1) solar water oxidation for the
formation of hydrogen as a potential fuel source,
and (2) the reduction of CO2 to synthetic fuels such as methane in order to be used as fuels.
During this work, you will fabricate Cu2O thin films and nanostructures by electro-deposition
and thermal annealing. You will then characterize the film properties by X-Ray Diffraction (XRD),
scanning electron microscopy (SEM), and UV-Vis spectroscopy in order to determine the crystal
structure, morphology, and optical properties of the materials. Last, you will probe the photocatalytic
properties of Cu2O films via photoelectrochemistry (PEC) to measure the current generation,
electronic properties, and photostability under solar irradiation. The goal is to correlate the physical
properties of Cu2O with its photoresponse, and to understand the photocorrosion mechanism so that it
can be easily passivated, thus drastically improving the viability of Cu2O as a functional
photoelectrode.
Interested? Contact Dr. Wilson Smith W.Smith@tudelft.nl or Prof. dr. Bernard Dam
B.Dam@tudelft.nl
Key words: Solar water splitting, CO2 reduction, Nano-materials, Photo-electrochemistry,
UV-vis spectroscopy, X-Ray diffractometry, Solar Fuel generation