Research interests in our group focus on artificial photosynthesis using chemical assemblies. The world needs to find ways to utilize sustainable energy sources rather than the present sources which heavily depend on fossil fuels and are major contributor for global CO2 emission. One of the viable strategies is production of solar fuels, in which chemical fuels are generated from H2O, CO2 and sunlight through photoelectrochemical reactions. This strategy stores energy in chemical bonds of fuel molecules which can be used and transported with current established infrastructure. Mother nature already developed this energy conversion scheme in green plants and other organism through the process of photosynthesis where H2O is oxidized, and CO2 is reduced to form carbohydrates that can be burned later for plant respiration. However, so far systems for artificial photosynthesis show low light-to-chemical efficiencies due to poor light absorption, inefficient electron transfers, slow catalysis rate and poor stability of systems under operating conditions. Our research addresses all these challenges and explore new systems to build high efficiency photoelectrochemical systems. Specifically, an emphasis will be given on understanding the electrochemical and photophysical processes happening at different components of the total scheme of artificial photosynthesis. The students in our lab will gain experience in organic and inorganic synthesis, purification techniques, materials chemistry, catalysis, electrochemistry and spectroscopy.
2011