화학공학소재연구정보센터
International Journal of Hydrogen Energy, Vol.45, No.1, 103-111, 2020
Boosting photoelectrochemical performance of GaN nanowall network photoanode with bacteriorhodopsin
The ever-increasing demand for renewable and clean energy sources has prompted the development of novel materials for photoelectrochemical (PEC) water splitting, but efficient solar to hydrogen conversion remains a big challenge. In this work, we report a bionanohybrid strategy in a photo-system to simultaneously enhance the charge separation and water splitting efficiency of photoanode (PA) by introducing Bacteriorhodopsin (bR), a natural proton pumping photosystem and GaN nanowall network (NWN), a direct band gap and corrosion-resistant semiconductor. The experimental study reveals that this combination of bR and GaN NWN has huge potential as a light-activated sensitizer as well as proton pumping source to achieve enhance photocurrent density in hydrogen evolution reaction (HER). Consequently, this synergistic effect in bR/GaN NWN PA gives rise to largely enhanced applied bias photon-to-current efficiency (ABPE) similar to 7.8% and photocurrent density (28.74 mA/cm(2) at 1.0 V vs RHE). It is worth mentioning that the photocurrent density of bR/GaN NWN, to the best of our knowledge, is superior to previously reported bR-based PAs and bio-photoelectric devices reported till today for solar-to-hydrogen fuel generation. (C) 2019 Hydrogen Energy Publications LLC. Published by Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.