Engineering Laboratory of Advanced Energy Materials, Ningbo Institute of Industrial Technology, Chinese Academy of Sciences, 315201 Ningbo, Zhejiang, China;
Ningbo Institute of Materials Technology and Engineering, Chinese Academy of Sciences, 315336 Ningbo, Zhejiang, China.
Proc Natl Acad Sci U S A. 2020 Jun 16;117(24):13256-13260. doi: 10.1073/pnas.2001753117. Epub 2020 Jun 1.
Artificial photosynthesis provides a way to store solar energy in chemical bonds. Achieving water splitting without an applied external potential bias provides the key to artificial photosynthetic devices. We describe here a tandem photoelectrochemical cell design that combines a dye-sensitized photoelectrosynthesis cell (DSPEC) and an organic solar cell (OSC) in a photoanode for water oxidation. When combined with a Pt electrode for H evolution, the electrode becomes part of a combined electrochemical cell for water splitting, 2HO → O + 2H, by increasing the voltage of the photoanode sufficiently to drive bias-free reduction of H to H The combined electrode gave a 1.5% solar conversion efficiency for water splitting with no external applied bias, providing a mimic for the tandem cell configuration of PSII in natural photosynthesis. The electrode provided sustained water splitting in the molecular photoelectrode with sustained photocurrent densities of 1.24 mA/cm for 1 h under 1-sun illumination with no applied bias.
人工光合作用提供了一种将太阳能储存在化学键中的方法。实现无外加外部电势偏置的水分解是人工光合器件的关键。我们在这里描述了一种串联光电化学电池设计，该设计将染料敏化光电合成电池（DSPEC）和有机太阳能电池（OSC）结合在光电阳极中以进行水氧化。当与 Pt 电极结合用于 H 演化时，该电极通过将光电阳极的电压增加到足以驱动无偏置 H 还原的程度，成为用于水分解的组合电化学电池的一部分，2HO → O + 2H，组合电极在没有外加偏置的情况下对水分解的太阳能转换效率为 1.5%，为天然光合作用中 PSII 的串联电池结构提供了模拟。该电极在分子光电电极中提供了持续的水分解，在 1 太阳光照下，没有外加偏置，持续的光电流密度为 1.24 mA/cm，持续 1 小时。
