1. Photocatalytic hydrogen production over solid solutions between BiFeO 3 and SrTiO 3
- Author
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Xiaoxiang Xu, Lingwei Lu, Meilin Lv, and Gang Liu
- Subjects
Range (particle radiation) ,Work (thermodynamics) ,Materials science ,Band gap ,Inorganic chemistry ,Analytical chemistry ,General Physics and Astronomy ,02 engineering and technology ,Surfaces and Interfaces ,General Chemistry ,010402 general chemistry ,021001 nanoscience & nanotechnology ,Condensed Matter Physics ,01 natural sciences ,0104 chemical sciences ,Surfaces, Coatings and Films ,Photocatalysis ,Quantum efficiency ,Irradiation ,0210 nano-technology ,Hydrogen production ,Solid solution - Abstract
Constituting solid solutions has been an appealing means to gain control over various physicochemical properties. In this work, we synthesized a series of SrTiO3-BiFeO3 solid solutions and systematically explored their structural, optical and photocatalytic properties. Our results show that all solid solutions crystallize in a primitive cubic structure and their band gap values can be easily tuned by adjusting molar ratios between SrTiO3 and BiFeO3. Photocatalytic hydrogen production under both full range and visible light irradiation is greatly improved after forming solid solutions. The highest hydrogen production rate obtained is ∼180 μmol/h under full range irradiation (λ ≥ 250 nm) and ∼4.2 μmol/h under visible light irradiation (λ ≥ 400 nm), corresponding to apparent quantum efficiency ∼2.28% and ∼0.10%, respectively. The activity is found to be strongly influenced by surface area and light absorption. Theoretical calculation suggests that Fe contributes to the formation of spin-polarized bands in the middle of original band gap and is responsible for the band gap reduction and visible light photocatalytic activity.
- Published
- 2017
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