Periodic Reporting for period 3 - CATALIGHT (Exploiting Energy Flow in Plasmonic-Catalytic Colloids)
Période du rapport: 2022-01-01 au 2023-06-30
The aim of CATALIGHT is to use sunlight as a sustainable source of energy in order to trigger chemical reactions by harvesting photons with plasmonic nanoparticles and funneling the energy into catalytic materials. Plasmonic-catalytic devices would allow efficient harvesting, transport and injection of solar energy into molecules.
The project takes as its basis many of the currently most important open questions within the management of sustainable energy at the nanoscale:
- The exploration of routes for novel and efficient uses of sunlight energy.
- The realization of functional nanoscale architectures using colloids as building blocks.
- The marriage between harvesting, transport and injection of sunlight into molecules.
The outcomes of this work will not only yield a substantial amount of new fundamental knowledge also directly exploitable results for the applied sciences, particularly photocatalysis and fuel cells.
On one side, we have mastered the synthesis of novel and complex plasmonic catalysts - either mono or bimetallic ones – and tested them towards sunlight-driven redox reactions, including hydrogen generation. As such, we have exploited and enhanced different properties by designing and synthetizing colloidal structures with internal hotspots, multiple hotspots or fractal character – among others - improving the light absorption and energy conversion capabilities of standard colloidal architectures.
Furthermore, we have explored different nanoscale phenomena taking place across the plasmonic metal – molecule interface. We described a new type of charge transfer process mediated by the electric double layer that surround plasmonic colloids. Moreover, by combining plasmonic colloids and electrochemical measurements, we reveled the energy of photoexcited electrons and holes in these systems.
Finally, we developed new techniques for both: mapping nanoscale temperature at plasmonic interfaces and producing large-scale patterning of plasmonic colloidal catalysts. These techniques constitute a fundamental step towards optimizing and scaling-up our experimental results.