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Modified TiO2 splits water more efficiently
n-Type TiO2 has been studied for some 30 years as a stable, inexpensive electrode material for splitting water to make hydrogen fuel. However, n-TiO2 is a poor absorber of solar light, which makes its efficiency less than optimal in the photoelectrochemical process. Attempts to lower the 3.0-eV band-gap energy of n-TiO2 by doping it with metals, for example, have not been very successful. AUTHOR now report a chemically modified n-TiO2 that has a band-gap of 2.32 eV, absorbing light well into the visible. The team prepared the material by oxidizing titanium in a natural gas flame. Micrographs of the prepared films show that the new material is more porous than n-TiO2, and X-ray photoelectron spectroscopic data indicate that carbon has replaced some oxygen to give an average composition of n-TiO1.85C0.15. The chemically modified TiO2 splits water with a maximum photoconversion efficiency of 8.35%, a significant improvement over the 1.08% measured for an n-type TiO2 sample.
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