English (United Kingdom)

https://curated-unify.zendy.io/wp-json/zendy-region/v1/featured_content/oa?rat=en

https://curated-unify.zendy.io/wp-json/zendy-region/v1/highlighted_journal/

Zendy Plus

Presents the access of premium content as premium feature

Premium Content

Presents the keyphrase highlighting as premium feature

Keyphrase Highlighting

Presents the summarisation as premium feature

Summarisation

Insights

Presents the pdf analysis as premium feature

PDF Analysis

Presents the zaia usage as premium feature

ZAIA

Zendy Tools

Zendy Open

Narrow-bandgap III-V semiconductor nanowires (NWs) with a suitable bandstructure and strong light-trapping ability are ideal for high-efficiencylow-cost solar water-splitting systems. However, due to their nanoscaledimension, they suffer more severe corrosion by the electrolyte solution thanthe thin-film counterparts. Thus, short-term durability is the major obstaclefor using these NWs for practical water splitting applications. Here, wedemonstrated for the first time that a thin layer (~7 nm thick) of compactTiO$_2$ deposited by atomic layer deposition can provide robust protection toIII-V NWs. The protected GaAs NWs maintain 91.4% of its photoluminescenceintensity after 14 months of storage in ambient atmosphere, which suggests theTiO$_2$ layer is pinhole-free. Working as a photocathode for water splitting,they exhibited a 45% larger photocurrent density compared with un-protectedcounterparts and a high Faraday efficiency of 91%, and can also maintain arecord-long highly-stable performance among narrow-bandgap III-V NWphotoelectrodes; after 67 hours photoelectrochemical stability test reaction instrong acid electrolyte solution (pH = 1), they show no apparent indication ofcorrosion, which is in stark contrast to the un-protected NWs that are fullyfailed after 35-hours. These findings provide an effective way to enhance bothstability and performance of III-V NW based photoelectrodes, which are highlyimportant for practical applications in solar-energy-based water splittingsystems.

Robust Protection of III-V Nanowires in Water Splitting by a Thin Compact TiO$_2$ Layer