Korean research team has developed a chiral oxide catalyst application technology that can improve the performance of photoelectrodes that produce hydrogen from water by absorbing sunlight, which is infinite energy.

The photoelectrochemical water splitting system is an eco-friendly future technology with low-cost materials and excellent theoretical efficiency. However, existing improvement methods have limitations in performance improvement because electrons are recognized as simple charge carriers, resulting in lower efficiency than theory. Accordingly, a new improvement plan from the viewpoint of quantum mechanics using a chiral material was suggested, but it was limited to organic molecular with low driving stability and catalytic activity.

In order to apply metal oxide-based chiral materials to photoelectrodes, the research team identified the mechanism of chirality transfer in the enantioselective synthesis of chiral metal oxides and applied them to photoelectrodes based on their understanding. In other words, the photocurrent density was improved through the application of a chiral metal oxide catalyst to the photoelectrode, and it contributed to suppressing by-products and improving oxygen generation efficiency.

Since the understanding of the chirality transfer mechanism in the precursor solution has made it possible to use it for various types of substrates and materials, it is expected to be applicable to a wide range of applications besides photoelectrodes.

Schematic diagram of chiral photoelectrode operation and comparison with achiral

[Reference] Im H., Ma S. et al., “Elucidating the Chirality Transfer Mechanisms During Enantioselective Synthesis for the Spin-Controlled Oxygen Evolution Reaction”, Energy & Environmental Science

[Main Author] Hayoung Im(Yonsei University), Sunihl Ma(Yonsei University), Jooho Moon(Yonsei University)

* Contact : Professor Jooho Moon (jmoon@yonsei.ac.kr)