The photocatalytic splitting of water which is also named artificial photosynthesis is one of the most promising techniques for converting light energy into hydrogen fuel. Herein, a general method has been developed for the synthesis of various hollow TiO2 micro/nanostructures with bacteria as templates. TiO2 hollow spheres and tubes, served as prototypes, are obtained via a surface sol-gel process. The hollow TiO2 structures exhibit superior photocatalytic hydrogen evolution activities under UV and visible light irradiation in the presence of sacrificial reagents. This work may have some indications for the structural effect on enhancing the photocatalytic hydrogen evolution performance which would pave a new pathway to tailor and improve catalytic properties over a broad range. Furthermore, the surface sol-gel process can also be extended to other hollow structured photocatalysts such as SnO2, ZrO2, Ga2O3 and so forth. The as-obtained materials may have application potentials in photocatalysis and solar energy storage/conversion.

Artificial photosynthesis by bacteria-templated micro/nanostructures

240th National Meeting (2010)

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