TY - DATA T1 - Directed Assembly of Nanoparticle Catalysts on Nanowire Photoelectrodes for Photoelectrochemical CO2 Reduction PY - 2016/08/05 AU - Qiao Kong AU - Dohyung Kim AU - Chong Liu AU - Yi Yu AU - Yude Su AU - Yifan Li AU - Peidong Yang UR - https://acs.figshare.com/articles/journal_contribution/Directed_Assembly_of_Nanoparticle_Catalysts_on_Nanowire_Photoelectrodes_for_Photoelectrochemical_CO_sub_2_sub_Reduction/3544844 DO - 10.1021/acs.nanolett.6b02321.s001 L4 - https://ndownloader.figshare.com/files/5609180 KW - surface area NW arrays KW - light-harvesting semiconductor nanowires KW - Si NW arrays KW - RHE KW - 120 mV overpotential KW - PL KW - CO 2 KW - photoelectrochemical water splitting KW - photoelectrode assembly process KW - Photoelectrochemical CO 2 Reduction KW - CO 2 reduction photoelectrodes KW - NW light absorbers KW - CO 2 reduction nanoparticle KW - 3 Cu NP KW - photoelectrochemical CO 2 reduction capability KW - NP catalysts KW - 3 Cu NPs N2 - Reducing carbon dioxide with a multicomponent artificial photosynthetic system, closely mimicking nature, represents a promising approach for energy storage. Previous works have focused on exploiting light-harvesting semiconductor nanowires (NW) for photoelectrochemical water splitting. With the newly developed CO2 reduction nanoparticle (NP) catalysts, direct interfacing of these nanocatalysts with NW light absorbers for photoelectrochemical reduction of CO2 becomes feasible. Here, we demonstrate a directed assembly of NP catalysts on vertical NW substrates for CO2-to-CO conversion under illumination. Guided by the one-dimensional geometry, well-dispersed assembly of Au3Cu NPs on the surface of Si NW arrays was achieved with facile coverage tunability. Such Au3Cu NP decorated Si NW arrays can readily serve as effective CO2 reduction photoelectrodes, exhibiting high CO2-to-CO selectivity close to 80% at −0.20 V vs RHE with suppressed hydrogen evolution. A reduction of 120 mV overpotential compared to the planar (PL) counterpart was observed resulting from the optimized spatial arrangement of NP catalysts on the high surface area NW arrays. In addition, this system showed consistent photoelectrochemical CO2 reduction capability up to 18 h. This simple photoelectrode assembly process will lead to further progress in artificial photosynthesis, by allowing the combination of developments in each subfield to create an efficient light-driven system generating carbon-based fuels. ER -