The impact of electrolytic pH on photoelectrochemical water oxidation.

Harnessing solar energy for clean and sustainable fuel production by photoelectrochemical water oxidation over different timescales has been extensively investigated. However, the light-driven photoelectrochemical water oxidation reaction for artificial photosynthesis suffers from poor photon-to-current efficiency. Herein, we demonstrate an experimental analysis of electrolytic pH on photoelectrochemical syngas production by varying the pH of the KOH and NaOH electrolytes using the N-ZnO photoelectrode and analyzing all variables.

BiVO/FeO/ZnFeO; triple heterojunction for an enhanced PEC performance for hydrogen generation.

n/n/n triple heterojunction photoanodes made up of Zr:W-BiVO, FeO, and ZnFeO metal oxides are fabricated through a simplistic spray pyrolysis method. Use of Zr and W as dopants in BiVO plays an important role as Zr increases the carrier density and W reduces the charge recombination. Further, FeO and ZnFeO serve as a protective layer for Zr:W-BiVO, which augmented the photoelectrochemical performance and achieved a 1.

Enhanced photoelectrochemical response of plasmonic Au embedded BiVO/FeO heterojunction.

The effect of embedding Au nanoparticles (NPs) in a BiVO/FeO heterojunction for photoelectrochemical water splitting is studied here for the first time. The present nanostructured heterojunction offers three major advantages over pristine BiVO and FeO: (i) the formation of a heterojunction between BiVO and FeO enhances the charge carrier separation and transfer, (ii) the layer of FeO provides protection to BiVO from photocorrosion and, (iii) the Au NPs possessing surface plasmon resonance (SPR) enhance the photoelectrochemical response by transferring energy to metal oxides by hot electron transfer (HET) and plasmon resonant energy transfer (PRET). The present study reveals that the heterojunction ITO/BiVO/FeO (with 32% v/v Au solution in both layers) gives the best performance and mitigates the limitations of both pristine FeO and BiVO.

Gradient doping - a case study with Ti-FeO towards an improved photoelectrochemical response.

The present study investigates the effect of gradient doping on modifying the photoelectrochemical response of Ti-doped FeO photoanodes for their use in sunlight based water splitting for hydrogen evolution. The deposition of a thin film over the ITO (tin doped indium oxide) substrate was carried out using a spray pyrolysis method. The concentration of dopant was varied from 0.

Molecular biology of deregulated gene expression in transformed C3H/10T1/2 mouse embryo cell lines induced by specific insoluble carcinogenic nickel compounds.

In the past, exposure of workers to mixtures of soluble and insoluble nickel compounds by inhalation during nickel refining correlated with increased incidences of lung and nasal cancers. Insoluble nickel subsulfide and nickel oxide (NiO) are carcinogenic in animals by inhalation; soluble nickel sulfate is not. Particles of insoluble nickel compounds were phagocytized by C3H/10T1/2 mouse embryo cells and induced morphological transformation in these cells with the following order of potency: NiO (black) > NiO (green) > nickel subsulfide.

Methane emissions from a coastal lagoon: Vembanad Lake, West Coast, India.

An attempt has been made to estimate methane fluxes from a tropical coastal wetland the Vembanad Lake, a lagoon along the West Coast of India. It has been found that Vembanad Lake contributes significant amount of methane to the atmosphere. Average emissions varied spatially within the lake.