Indium-oxide (InO) nanobelts coated by a 5-nm-thick carbon layer provide an enhanced photocatalytic reduction of CO to CO and CH, yielding CO and CH evolution rates of 126.6 and 27.9 μmol h, respectively, with water as reductant and Pt as co-catalyst. The carbon coat promotes the absorption of visible light, improves the separation of photoinduced electron-hole pairs, increases the chemisorption of CO, makes more protons from water splitting participate in CO reduction, and thereby facilitates the photocatalytic reduction of CO to CO and CH.
Inspired by natural photosynthesis, biomaterial-based catalysts are being confirmed to be excellent for visible-light-driven photocatalysis, but are far less well explored. Herein, an ultrathin and uniform biofilm fabricated from cold-plasma-assisted peptide self-assembly was employed to support Eosin Y (EY) and Pt nanoparticles to form an EY/Pt/Film catalyst for photocatalytic water splitting to H2 and photocatalytic CO2 reduction with water to CO, under irradiation of visible light. The H2 evolution rate on EY/Pt/Film is 62.1 μmol h(-1), which is about 5 times higher than that on Pt/EY and 1.5 times higher than that on the EY/Pt/TiO2 catalyst. EY/Pt/Film exhibits an enhanced CO evolution rate (19.4 μmol h(-1)), as compared with Pt/EY (2.8 μmol h(-1)) and EY/Pt/TiO2 (6.1 μmol h(-1)). The outstanding activity of EY/Pt/Film results from the unique flexibility of the biofilm for an efficient transfer of the photoinduced electrons. The present work is helpful for designing efficient biomaterial-based catalysts for visible-light-driven photocatalysis and for imitating natural photosynthesis.
An electrocatalytic glucose oxidation
reaction (GOR) is crucial
for building a high-efficiency biofuel cell for a more sustainable
society and constructing a sophisticated device to precisely detect
trace amounts of glucose in blood and food for a more healthy life.
Yet, the reported GOR catalysts suffer low activity (current induced
by catalysts toward 1 mM glucose in a 1 cm–2 electrode,
μA mM–1 cm–2), slow response,
and poor response to trace glucose. Herein, we fabricate noble-metal-free
WO3-decorated carbon nanotubes with strong W–C bonds
(WO3/CNT60) (CNT, carbon nanotube). In the GOR, WO3/CNT60 triggers an activity as high as 1960 μA mM–1 cm–2, a response time of only 3
s, and a response minimum of only 5 μM and exhibits outstanding
stability, anti-interference ability to impurities, and reusability.
The GOR performance of WO3/CNT60 is much better than the
WO3/CNT catalyst without W–C bonds (1320 μA
mM–1 cm–2, 10 s, 40 μM)
and the widely used noble-metal catalyst (270 μA mM–1 cm–2, 10 s, 25 μM). The strong W–C
bonds create more C–W–O–W bridge sites active
for catalyzing the GOR, thus enhancing the GOR performance of WO3/CNT60. These results open a new way for fabricating a noble-metal-free
high-efficiency biofuel cell and sophisticated device to precisely
detect trace amounts of glucose and are also helpful for detecting
and converting complex molecules like polyols and poly(carboxylic
acid)s.
scite is a Brooklyn-based organization that helps researchers better discover and understand research articles through Smart Citations–citations that display the context of the citation and describe whether the article provides supporting or contrasting evidence. scite is used by students and researchers from around the world and is funded in part by the National Science Foundation and the National Institute on Drug Abuse of the National Institutes of Health.