A novel thin film photocatalysts of Ti/TNT/N-I-P/NaTaO3 for water splitting to liberate H2 and O2 separately

In this paper, a new thin film photocatalysts of Ti/TNT/N-I-P/NaTaO3 (the nanostructures is Ti/TiO2/TiO2-PbS-NiO/NaTaO3) is designed for photocatalytic water splitting. This photocatalysts can separate the evolution gas of H-2 and O-2 into the different sides of the Ti substrate. It is because that the p-i-n junction can separate and transport the photogenerated electrons and holes to their opposing reaction centers. Moreover, these thin film photocatalysts can be recycled again. Which is different from traditional powdered photocatalysts. The photocatalytic activities for water splitting show that the amounts of evolved gas of Ti/TNT/N-I-P/NaTaO3 is 8.73 mu mol/h cm(2) under high-pressure mercury lamp illuminations, which is 7 times higher than that of Ti/NaTaO3 thin film photocatalysts. Two aspects can contribute to this performance: the one is the structure of N-I-P/NaTaO3; the other one is electrical conduction layer TNT. This study provides a new insight into synthesis of thin film photocatalysts to liberate H-2 and O-2 separately from H2O. (C) 2016 Published by Elsevier B.V.