Chinese Journal of Catalysis ›› 2019, Vol. 40 ›› Issue (4): 486-494.DOI: 10.1016/S1872-2067(19)63311-5

• Article • Previous Articles     Next Articles

Blocking backward reaction on hydrogen evolution cocatalyst in a photosystem II hybrid Z-scheme water splitting system

Zhen Lia,b, Yu Qia, Wangyin Wanga, Deng Lia,b, Zheng Lia,b, Yanan Xiaob,c, Guangye Hanc, Jian-Ren Shenc,d, Can Lia   

  1. a State Key Laboratory of Catalysis, Dalian Institute of Chemical Physics, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Dalian National Laboratory for Clean Energy, Collaborative Innovation Center of Chemistry for Energy Materials(iChEM), Dalian 116023, Liaoning, China;
    b University of Chinese Academy of Sciences, Beijing 100049, China;
    c Photosynthesis Research Center, Key Laboratory of Photobiology, Institute of Botany, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Beijing 100093, China;
    d Research Institute for Interdisciplinary Science, Graduate School of Natural Science and Technology, Okayama University, Okayama 700-8530, Japan
  • Received:2018-11-21 Revised:2019-01-07 Online:2019-04-18 Published:2019-03-14
  • Supported by:

    This work was supported by the Strategic Priority Research Program of Chinese Academy of Sciences (XDB17000000), the Key Research Program of Frontier Sciences, CAS (QYZDY-SSW-JSC023), the National Natural Science Foundation of China (21603224, 31470339), and the National Key R&D Program of China (2017YFA0503700).

Abstract:

Photocatalytic Z-scheme water splitting is considered as a promising approach to produce solar hydrogen. However, the forward hydrogen production reaction is often impeded by backward reactions. In the present study, in a photosystem Ⅱ-integrated hybrid Z-scheme water splitting system, the backward hydrogen oxidation reaction was significantly suppressed by loading a PtCrOx cocatalyst on a ZrO2/TaON photocatalyst. Due to the weak chemisorption and activation of molecular hydrogen on PtCrOx, where Pt is stabilized in the oxidized forms, Pt and PtIV, hydrogen oxidation is inhibited. However, it is remarkably well-catalyzed by the metallic Pt cocatalyst, thereby rapidly consuming the produced hydrogen. This work describes an approach to inhibit the backward reaction in the photosystem Ⅱ-integrated hybrid Z-scheme water splitting system using Fe(CN)63-/Fe(CN)64- redox couple as an electron shuttle.

Key words: Water splitting, Cocatalyst, Backward reaction, Hydrogen oxidation, Photosystem II