Nano clusters for fabrication of green hydrogen and solar fuels

Project description

Hydrogen (H2) has been identified as an important future energy resource and requires Physics and Chemistry research as well as input from Engineering. Green H2 (GH2) can be generated via solar energy to meet the demand of reducing the use of fossil energy resources. Photocatalytic water splitting uses sunlight directly to split H2O into H2 and O2. The process requires an efficient photocatalyst. We are working on two aspects to facilitate this process: a) a protective overlayer to avoid the recombination of H2 and O2 to H2O to improve the overall efficiency and b) efficient co-catalyst facilitating the H2O splitting reaction. For b) we use small metal clusters containing only 4 – 100 metal atoms. Each cluster type used consists of a specific number of atoms with atomic precision. The project is a collaboration between Flinders University, the University of Adelaide, Michigan University (USA), Imperial College London (GB) and the University of Tokyo (Japan). The hydrogen produced can be used to react CO2 to hydrocarbons which then can be used as fuel.

Assumed knowledge

Basic knowledge in Physics and/or Chemistry

Industry involvement

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You must also contact each supervisor directly to discuss both the project details and your suitability to undertake the project.