2011 Annual Meeting

(97b) Converting Carbon Dioxide and Water Into Hydrocarbons with Solar Engergy and Nanostructured Metal Surfaces

Authors

Mengyan Shen - Presenter, University of Massachusetts Lowell
Cong Wang - Presenter, University of Delware
Haibin Huo - Presenter, University of Massachusetts Lowell
Haizhou Ren - Presenter, University of Massachusetts Lowell
Michael Johnson - Presenter, University of Massachusetts Lowell


We report femtosecond laser induced self-assembled metal nanostructure arrays can directly synthesize liquid and solid hydrocarbon compounds from carbon dioxide, water, and sunlight at a high production rate which is much higher than those in previous studies. Moreover, different from previous artificial photosynthesis works, this phenomenon presents a new mechanism that, through a surface-enhanced photodissociation process, nature-like photosynthesis can be performed artificially.