When Nano Break H2O

by Prof. Sayan Bhattacharyya (Indian Institute of Science Education and Research, Kolkata)

Monday, July 9, 2018 from 16:00 to 17:00 (Asia/Kolkata)
at AG-69

Description

While H₂O (water) is life to all living organisms on earth, it is also one of the key technological components of hydrogen economy. In an electrolysis cell, water can be decomposed into hydrogen and oxygen due to an electric current passing through it. Although hydrogen evolution reaction (HER) is the major reaction of interest, oxygen evolution reaction (OER) is the most energy intensive step. To overcome the activation barrier of splitting water, a catalyst is needed. The more active and stable the catalyst, more effective is the splitting. One of our major research interests is to develop nanoheterostructured electrocatalysts for OER and HER,^1,2 thereby leading to overall water splitting.³ The best performances are obtained not only by designing a suitable catalyst but also by optimizing the substrate on which the catalyst nanoparticles are supported, among which flexible substrates are fascinating.⁴ When the electrolyzer is integrated to solar cells, water photolysis with high solar-to-hydrogen efficiency also becomes possible.

References :

1.      Datta, A.; Kapri, S.; Bhattacharyya, S. J. Mater. Chem. A 2016, 4, 14614-14624.
2.      Debnath, B.; Kumar, A.; Salunke, H. G.; Bhattacharyya, S. J. Phys. Chem. C 2017, 121, 25594-25602.
3.      Kumar, A.; Bhattacharyya, S. ACS Appl. Mater. Interfaces 2017, 9, 41906-41915.
4.  Sahasrabudhe, A.; Dixit, H.; Majee, R.; Bhattacharyya, S. Nat. Commun. 2018, 9, 2014.