Bridging Hydroxyls on Anatase TiO$_2$ (101) by Water Dissociation in Oxygen Vacancies
Résumé
Titanium dioxide is a promising candidate for photocatalytic H$_2$ fuel production, and understanding water splitting on TiO$_2$ surfaces is vital toward explaining and improving the generation of H$_2$. In this work, we electron irradiate anatase TiO$_2$ (101) at room temperature to create metastable surface oxygen vacancies in order to investigate their ability to dissociate H$_2$O. Our scanning tunneling microscopy investigations suggest that the surface oxygen vacancies can dissociate H$_2$by forming bridging OH species. This claim is supported by theoretical calculations from the literature and our previously published spectroscopic measurements.
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