Abstract
In this work, we investigate the controlled fabrication of Sn-doped TiO2 nanorods (Sn/TiO2 NRs) for photoelectrochemical water splitting. Sn is incorporated into the rutile TiO2 nanorods with Sn/Ti molar ratios ranging from 0% to 3% by a simple solvothermal synthesis method. The obtained Sn/TiO2 NRs are single crystalline with a rutile structure. The concentration of Sn in the final nanorods can be well controlled by adjusting the molar ratio of the precursors. Photoelectrochemical experiments are conducted to explore the photocatalytic activity of Sn/TiO2 NRs with different doping levels. Under the illumination of solar simulator with the light intensity of 100 mW/cm2, our measurements reveal that the photocurrent increases with increasing doping level and reaches the maximum value of 1.01 mA/cm2 at −0.4 V versus Ag/AgCl, which corresponds to up to about 50% enhancement compared with the pristine TiO2 NRs. The Mott-Schottky plots indicate that incorporation of Sn into TiO2 nanorod can significantly increase the charge carrier density, leading to enhanced conductivity of the nanorod. Furthermore, we demonstrate that Sn/TiO2 NRs can be a promising candidate for photoanode in photoelectrochemical water splitting because of their excellent chemical stability.
Highlights
Growing global energy demand and increasing concern for climate change have aroused the interest in new technologies to harness energy from renewable sources while decreasing dependence on fossil fuels [1,2]
We successfully realized the controlled incorporation of Sn into TiO2 nanorods by a simple solvothermal synthesis method and investigated the role of Sn doping for enhanced photocatalytic activity in photoelectrochemical water splitting
A wide range of precursor molar ratios (SnCl4/TBOT = 0% to 3%) in the initial reactant mixture were used for Sn doping, and almost no noticeable morphology change was observed, except that when the molar ratio reached to 8% the difference turned out to be obvious, as shown in (Additional file 1: Figure S2)
Summary
Growing global energy demand and increasing concern for climate change have aroused the interest in new technologies to harness energy from renewable sources while decreasing dependence on fossil fuels [1,2]. One of the most attractive approaches is to produce hydrogen by solar water splitting, because of the high energy density of hydrogen and zero harmful byproduct after combustion as a fuel [3,4]. The SnO2/TiO2 composite fibers have emerged and showed well photocatalytic property [30,31] Based on these researches, we expect that the incorporation of Sn into TiO2 would be an attractive approach since the small lattice mismatch between TiO2 and SnO2 is beneficial for the structural compatibility and stability. We successfully realized the controlled incorporation of Sn into TiO2 nanorods by a simple solvothermal synthesis method and investigated the role of Sn doping for enhanced photocatalytic activity in photoelectrochemical water splitting
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