We report a plasmon-assisted growth of metal and semiconductor onto the tips of Ag nanotriangles (AgNTs) under light irradiation. The site-selective growth of Ag onto AgNTs are firstly demonstrated on the copper grids and amine-coated glass slides. As the irradiation time increases, microscopic images indicate that AgNTs gradually touch with each other and finally "weld" tip-to-tip together int...

MgxZn1 xO (0rxr0.13) films grown by metal-organic chemical vapor deposition (MOCVD) were chosen as the n-type semiconductor layer forming a heterojunction with electrodeposited p-type cuprous oxide (Cu2O) for photovoltaic applications in this study. We investigated the effects of Mg contents (x) on the performance of Ag–Cu2O–MgxZn1 xO–fluorine-doped tin oxide (FTO)-glass heterojunction solar ce...

Electrochemical conversion of carbon dioxide (CO2) to small organic fuels (e.g. formate, methanol, ethylene, ethanol) is touted as one of the most promising approaches for solving the problems of climate change and energy security. In this study, we report the highly efficient electrochemical reduction of CO2 using cuprous oxide (Cu2O) electrodes to produce ethylene (C2H4) primarily. During CO2...

To obtain insight into the structure and surface stoichiometry of copper-based catalysts in commercially important chemical reactions such as the oxygen-assisted water-gas shift reaction, we perform densityfunctional theory calculations to investigate the relative stability of low-index copper oxide surfaces. By employing the technique of “ab initio atomistic thermodynamics,” we identify low-en...

Cu2O hierarchical nanostructures with different morphologies were successfully synthesized by a solvothermal method using copper (II) nitrate trihydrate (Cu(NO3)2⋅3H2O) and ethylene glycol (EG) as initial reagents. The obtained nanostructures were characterized by X-ray diffraction (XRD), scanning electron microscopy (SEM), Brunauer-Emmett-Teller (BET) specific surface area test, and UV-vis spe...

Metal-semiconductor-based photocatalysts show high efficiencies and catalytic activities in the photocatalysis process. Herein, the magnetic and one-dimensional Ni-Cu2O heteronanowires have been fabricated via in situ reduction of pre-adsorbed Cu(2+) on the surface of prickly Ni nanowires in an ethanol solution for photocatalysis application. The resultant Ni-Cu2O heteronanowires show higher ph...

Cu2O is a p-type direct bandgap semiconductor with band gap of 2~2.2 eV, which has excellent visible light absorption and utilization. However, slow charge transfer poor stability hinder its practical application. In this paper, facile electrodeposition approach successfully synthesized the heterostructure p-Cu2O n-Cu2O. The protective layer n-Cu2O on surface nanoparticles forms p/n heterojunct...

Valence band (VB) changes and hence electronic structure evolution was directly observed with low kinetic energy (KE) electrons at near ambient pressure (NAP) conditions with He I photon source in a custom built laboratory ambient pressure photoelectron spectrometer (Lab-APPES). Polycrystalline Cu surfaces were gradually oxidized in O2 to Cu2O, to a mixture of Cu2O + CuO, and finally to CuO bet...

The influence of alloying element S, Se or Te on the oxidation resistance of pure Cu was studied by oxidizing in 0.1 MPa pure oxygen atmosphere at 573-873 K in comparison with a 6N Cu (99.9999 wt.%). The addition of S, Se or Te is found to improve the oxidation resistance of Cu remarkably. This improvement is contributed from the accumulation of alloying element at the Cu2O/Cu interface and seg...

We present a systematic study on the effects of electrodeposition parameters on the photoelectrochemical properties of Cu2O. The influence of deposition variables (temperature, pH, and deposition current density) on conductivity has been widely explored in the past for this semiconductor, but the optimization of the electrodeposition process for the photoelectrochemical response in aqueous solu...