TY - GEN A1 - Tallarida, Massimo A1 - Das, Chittaranjan A1 - Cibrev, Dejan A1 - Kukli, Kaupo A1 - Tamm, Aile A1 - Ritala, Mikko A1 - Lana-Villarreal, Teresa A1 - Gómez, Roberto A1 - Leskelä, Markku A1 - Schmeißer, Dieter T1 - Modification of Hematite Electronic Properties with Trimethyl Aluminum to Enhance the Efficiency of Photoelectrodes T2 - The Journal of Physical Chemistry Letters N2 - The electronic properties of hematite were investigated by means of synchrotron radiation photoemission (SR-PES) and X-ray absorption spectroscopy (XAS). Hematite samples were exposed to trimethyl aluminum (TMA) pulses, a widely used Al-precursor for the atomic layer deposition (ALD) of Al2O3. SR-PES and XAS showed that the electronic properties of hematite were modified by the interaction with TMA. In particular, the hybridization of O 2p states with Fe 3d and Fe 4s4p changed upon TMA pulses due to electron inclusion as polarons. The change of hybridization correlates with an enhancement of the photocurrent density due to water oxidation for the hematite electrodes. Such an enhancement has been associated with an improvement in charge carrier transport. Our findings open new perspectives for the understanding and utilization of electrode modifications by very thin ALD films and show that the interactions between metal precursors and substrates seem to be important factors in defining their electronic and photoelectrocatalytic properties. KW - Hematite KW - Atomic Layer deposition KW - Photoelectrode KW - electro-catalysis KW - TMA KW - efficiency enhancement Y1 - 2014 UR - https://opus4.kobv.de/opus4-UBICO/frontdoor/index/index/docId/12122 VL - 5 IS - 20 SP - 3582 EP - 3587 ER -