Photocatalytic overall water splitting by SrTiO3 with surface oxygen vacancies

Abstract

Strontium Titanate has a typical perovskite structure with advantages of low cost and photochemical stability. However, the wide bandgap and rapid recombination of electrons and holes limited its application in photocatalysis. In this work, a SrTiO3 material with surface oxygen vacancies was synthesized via carbon reduction under a high temperature. It was successfully applied for photocatalytic overall water splitting to produce clean hydrogen energy under visible light irradiation without any sacrificial reagent for the first time. The photocatalytic overall water splitting ability of the as-prepared SrTiO3-C950 is attributed to the surface oxygen vacancies that can make suitable energy levels for visible light response, improving the separation and transfer efficiency of photogenerated carriers.