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NEW (2016.04.05)Ajou's Professor In Sun Cho develops a low-cost highly efficient nano doping technology

  • 2016-04-26
  • 23503

 

A team including Ajou University Professor In Sun Cho (pictured above) developed a low-cost, highly efficient nanomaterial doping technology.
 
 
The findings were published as the cover paper in the February 18th edition of The Advanced Energy Materials. For the research, Professor Cho teamed up with Professor Xiaolin Zheng and Hyun Soo Han, a post-doctoral researcher, from the Department of Mechanical Engineering, Stanford University in the U.S. The study was conducted with the support for new researchers carried out by the Ministry of Science, ICT and Future Planning and the National Research Foundation of Korea.
 
 
Professor Cho’s team developed a new nanomaterial doping technology using flames, which more than doubled the solar-to-hydrogen conversion efficiency of the hematite (α-Fe2O3) catalyst, a representative low-priced material of photoanodes. Doping is a technology for controlling electric and optical properties of semiconductors by adding impurities.
 
 
The research team grew nanorod (NR)-shaped hematite on a transparent electrode with a low temperature solution process and evenly coated doping precursor including titanium on it. It then conducted a fast heat treatment with a high-temperature flame. In this process, the team succeeded in evenly doping and controlling high-density titanium without changing morphology or properties of the NRs. 
 
 
After that, the research team removed inert film in a solution-based etching process and coated the FeOOH with a subsidiary catalyst. The process improved both the movement of electric charge and surface properties within hematite photoanodes, which more than doubled the efficiency of hematite-based photoelectrochemical elements. 
 
 
Professor Cho said, "The doping technology that we have developed consists of quite a simple process and takes only a few seconds or minutes," adding, "It can be applied to various photoanode materials for inorganic semiconductors."
 
 
He explained that the technology can be used to develop nanomaterials including solar batteries, which are the key to energy-related technologies, and to improve their performance. 
 
 
Professor Cho went on to say, "The findings are expected to contribute to developing next-generation nanomaterials for generating high-efficiency and low-cost hydrogen energy, and to developing essential technologies for designing photoelectrochemical elements."
 
 
Ti4+ 전구체가 코팅된 산화철 광전극 시편:
A hematite photoanode sample coated with Ti4+ precursor
 
< A scene from flame doping process>