Name: Alexey Cherevan
Diploma / M.Sc degree: Moscow State University, Russia
(June 2010)

PhD Project: Nanocarbon-metal oxide hybrids for photocatalytic applications

Abstract of Research Project

There is an ever growing need to protect our environment by increasing energy efficiency and developing “clean” energy sources. These are global challenges, and their resolution is vital to our energy security. Using the energy of sunlight to split water into its constituent elements, oxygen and hydrogen, is the key requirement to realise the successful use of hydrogen as a clean energy source and was recently identified by the European Science Foundation as one of the world’s emerging key research fields.

Many conventional materials, such as metals, ceramics, and plastics, cannot fulfil all requirements for these new technologies. It appears that these frontiers will not be realised solely by developing new materials, but by optimising material combinations on different length scales, taking advantage of their synergistic functions.

Recent years saw the introduction of a promising new class of multifunctional materials, nanocarbon-inorganic hybrids, which have a huge potential to overcome these limitations. In contrast to composites, where a tiny volume fraction of the nanocarbon, i.e. graphene or carbon nanotubes (CNTs), is used as a nanostructured filler within an organic or inorganic matrix, hybrids are created by coating the nanocarbons with a thin layer of the functional inorganic material (i.e. semiconductor photocatalyst). The benefits of this system arise from the close proximity of the two compounds, which enables interfacial charge and energy processes. Based on these processes, the nanocarbon can act both as a photosensitizer for an extended absorption range as well as an efficient electron acceptor for photoexcited electrons from the semiconductor, which increases the lifetime of electrons and holes via charge separation.

The aim of our research is to synthesize and apply new hybrid materials for hydrogen production and other photocatalytic applications.



Publications

A. S. Cherevan, P.Gebhardt, C. J. Shearer, M. Matsukawa, K. Domen, D. Eder
Interface engineering in nanocarbon–Ta₂O₅ hybrid photocatalysts
Energy Environ. Sci. 7 (2014), 791-796.