Supramolecular catalyst with [FeCl₄] unit boosting photoelectrochemical seawater splitting via water nucleophilic...

Propelled by the structure of water oxidation co-catalysts in natural photosynthesis, molecular co-catalysts have long been believed to possess the developable potential in artificial photosynthesis. However, the interfacial complexity between light absorber and molecular co-catalyst limits its structural stability and charge transfer efficiency. To overcome the challenge, a supramolecular scaffold with the [FeCl₄] catalytic units is reported, which undergo a water-nucleophilic attack of the water oxidation reaction, while the supramolecular matrix can be in-situ grown on the surface of photoelectrode through a simple chemical polymerization to be a strongly coupled interface. A well-defined BiVO₄ photoanode hybridized with [FeCl₄] units in polythiophene reaches 4.72 mA cm^-2 at 1.23 V_RHE, which also exhibits great stability for photoelectrochemical seawater splitting due to the restraint on chlorine evolution reaction by [FeCl₄] units and polythiophene. This work provides a novel solution to the challenge of the interface charge transfer of molecular co-catalyst hybridized photoelectrode.