Wang, Cong and Shen, Mengyan and Huo, Haibin and Ren, Haizhou and Johnson, Michael. (2011) Using metal nanostructures to form hydrocarbons from carbon dioxide, water and sunlight. AIP Advances, 1 (4). 042124. ISSN 21583226
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Based on experimental results, we propose a mechanism that allows the use of metal nanostructures to synthesize hydrocarbons and carbohydrates from carbon dioxide, water and sunlight. When sunlight impinges on cobalt nanostructures in a glass chamber, its intensity is greatly enhanced around the tips of the nanostructures through surface plasmon excitations focusing effect, and it then photodissociates the water and carbon dioxide molecules through enhanced photon absorptions of ions around the tips of the nanostructures. The photodissociated molecules in excited states remain on the cobalt nanostructure surfaces and various hydrocarbons and carbohydrates then will be formed around the surfaces at temperatures much lower than 100C.
|Uncontrolled Keywords:||cobalt, excited states, nanofabrication, nanostructured materials, optical focusing, organic compounds, photodissociation, photoexcitation, surface plasmons|
|InterNano Taxonomy:||Nanoscale Objects and Nanostructured Materials > Nanostructured Materials
Areas of Application > Energy and Utilities
|Collections:||Nanomanufacturing Research Collection > Nanomanufacturing Nanoscale Science and Engineering Centers > Center for High-rate Nanomanufacturing|
|Depositing User:||Robert Stevens|
|Date Deposited:||27 Oct 2011 15:15|
|Last Modified:||27 Oct 2011 15:30|
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