Zhao Chenxi, Zhou Liqin, Zhang Zhenqian, Gao Zhida, Weng Hongming, Zhang Wei, Li Lingwei, Song Yan-Yan
College of Sciences, Northeastern University, Shenyang 110004, China.
Beijing National Laboratory for Condensed Matter Physics and Institute of Physics, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Beijing 100190, China.
J Phys Chem Lett. 2020 Nov 19;11(22):9931-9937. doi: 10.1021/acs.jpclett.0c02927. Epub 2020 Nov 10.
Boosting photocatalytic performance via external fields is an alternative and effective solution for improving the application performance of existing photocatalysts. Herein, using α-FeO-decorated TiO nanotube arrays as a model, we demonstrate the influence of magnetic field (MF)-direction on the photogenerated charge-carrier transfer behavior at plasmonic metal/semiconductor interfaces. For the first time, the photocatalytic activity is also found to correlate with the plasmonic metal species while applying an external MF. As verified by first-principles calculations, the spin-orbit coupling of metal contributes to the charge-carrier transfer. To highlight the anisotropic MF-tuning effect in practical applications, the as-prepared architecture is applied for photocatalysis-triggered drug delivery. The delivery rate can be remarkably accelerated by ∼38% under a tiny MF (0.4 T) with the proper direction. The findings in this research may provide new insight into designing semiconductor architectures for boosting the photocatalytical performance in an external MF.
通过外部场增强光催化性能是提高现有光催化剂应用性能的一种有效替代方案。在此，以α-FeO修饰的TiO纳米管阵列作为模型，我们展示了磁场（MF）方向对等离子体金属/半导体界面处光生电荷载流子转移行为的影响。首次发现，在施加外部MF时，光催化活性也与等离子体金属种类相关。第一性原理计算证实，金属的自旋轨道耦合有助于电荷载流子转移。为了突出实际应用中的各向异性MF调谐效应，将所制备的结构应用于光催化触发的药物递送。在具有适当方向的微小MF（0.4 T）下，递送速率可显著加快约38%。本研究中的发现可能为设计用于在外部MF中提高光催化性能的半导体结构提供新的见解。
