Synthesis of Metal Oxide and Semiconductor Materials for Solar Energy Utilization

A special issue of Inorganics (ISSN 2304-6740). This special issue belongs to the section "Inorganic Materials".

Deadline for manuscript submissions: closed (31 August 2023) | Viewed by 774

Special Issue Editors

College of Materials Science and Engineering, Hunan University, Changsha 410082, China
Interests: metal oxides; photocatlysis; solar cells; thin-film devices

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Guest Editor
College of Materials Science and Engineering, Hunan University, Changsha 410082, China
Interests: energy materials; semiconductor photocatalysis; green synthesis of solar fuels; new solar energy

Special Issue Information

Dear Colleagues,

Sunlight has a great potential to replace current fossil fuels due to its abundance and environmental merit. Photocatalytic and photovoltaic processes are accepted as desirable ways to convert solar energy efficiently. Under the irradiation of sunlight, photocatalysts can split water into hydrogen and oxygen gas, convert CO2 into fuels and chemicals, and degrade organic pollutants into H2O and CO2 without introducing additional pollutants. Photovoltaic devices can directly convert solar energy into electricity. Recently, perovskite solar cells have become one of the most popular photovoltaic device types. Considering the solar energy conversion, metal oxide semiconductors have been extensively studied recently because of their many advantages, such as chemical stability, suitable band gap structures, and abundance on the Earth. The controlled synthesis of metal oxide semiconductors and the overall architecture of nanocomposites is one of the most important factors dictating their physical properties, and thus their photochemical capabilities. The deployment of an efficient and stable metal oxide that can absorb sunlight in a broad spectrum, transfer photogenerated charges with high efficiencies, and catalyze the desired chemical reactions is necessary for the realization of scalable technologies for photoelectrochemical solar energy conversion. In this regard, promising results have been achieved in various well-defined metal oxide semiconductors with tailored shapes, structures, and compositions at the atomic scale. Despite these exciting results, the road towards the full use of metal oxide semiconductor is long.

This Special Issue will cover the most recent efforts in the development of metal oxide semiconductors for photoconversion applications. Therefore, we cordially invite you to submit original, excellent papers and review articles outlining the remarkable progress in synthesis, characterization, understanding of structure–property relationships, and (more recently) advanced applications incorporating metal oxide semiconductors.

Dr. Javid Khan
Prof. Dr. Lei Han
Guest Editors

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Keywords

  • metal oxides semiconductor
  • photoconversion
  • optoelectronic devices
  • solar fuels
  • water splitting
  • CO2 reduction
  • environmental remediation

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Published Papers

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