We employ ultrafast transient absorption spectroscopy to investigate the sequence of photoinduced charge transfer events underlying photocatalytic cycle of hydrogen generation in hybrid metal-semiconductor heteronanocrystals. The architecture of colloidal nanoparticles consisting of charge-separating semiconductor domain (ZnSe/CdS) appended with a catalytic metal component (Pt) is designed to drive photoinduced charges in opposite ends of the structure where the carriers can perform their respective catalytic reactions. The ultrafast measurements show that the internal electron-hole separation is fast ( 400 ps) and is viewed here as the bottleneck of the catalytic cycle of hydrogen generation.

Ultrafast spectroscopy of catalytic reactions in ZnSe/CdS/Pt colloidal heteronanocrystals

244th National Meeting (2012)

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