A silicon photoanode for efficient ethanol oxidation under alkaline conditions

作者：Cai, Qian; Hong, Wenting; Li, Jing; Jian, Chuanyong; Liu, Wei^*

来源：RSC Advances, 2017, 7(35): 21809-21814.

DOI：10.1039/c7ra02848b

• REDUCED GRAPHENE OXIDE
• METHANOL OXIDATION
• NANOTUBE ARRAYS
• WATER OXIDATION
• FUEL-CELLS
• PERFORMANCE
• ELECTROCATALYSTS
• REDUCTION
• CATALYSTS
• COBALT

Silicon (Si) is an attractive semiconductor which has broad applications in photovoltaic fields due to its low cost and narrow band gap (similar to 1.1 eV). Taking advantage of a Si-based metal-insulator-semiconductor (MIS) device, which has high electron-hole separation efficiency due to the confined electron and hole transport directions, for the first time, a Pt/ZrO2/n-Si photoanode is directly employed as the anode for the ethanol oxidation reaction (EOR). When exposed to visible light irradiation, the Pt/ZrO2/n-Si photoanode exhibits apparently improved EOR activity and durability. This work provides a simple way to fabricate Si-based EOR photoanodes, which has potential for application in direct ethanol fuel cells.

• 出版日期2017
• 单位中国科学院福建物质结构研究所