Advanced photocathode and photoanode materials for solar water splitting


Project is focused on the detailed research of semiconductor oxide layer and multi-layer structures suitable as photocathode (photoanode) in the solar water splitting. As photocathodes, oxides Cu2O, CuFeO2, and CuBi2O4 will be examined. As photoanodes, pure and doped Fe2O3, WO3 and BiVO4 and then heterojunctions WO3/BiVO4 and Fe2O3/BiVO4 will be investigated. For film preparation the advanced deposition methods including reactive magnetron sputtering, spray pyrolysis and electrodeposition will be applied. Semiconductor layers will be evaluated in terms of their physical and photoelectrochemical (PEC) properties and the layer parameters (thickness, crystalline structure, porosity, dopant type, etc.) will be optimized. Improvement of the (PEC) properties of photoelecrodes for the solar water splitting will be achieved by i) precise control of parameters of produced films, ii) doping, iii) using multi-layer structures and iv) deposition of suitable co-catalyst for hydrogen (oxygen) evolution. The most active photoelectrodes will form a system of autonomous tandem cells for non-assisted.