Tantalate-based Perovskite for Solar Energy Applications

To realize a sustainable society in the near future, the development of clean, renewable, cheap and sustainable resources and the remediation of environmental pollutions using solar energy as the driving force would be important. During the past few decades, plenty of efforts have been focused on this area to develop solar light active materials to meet the increased energy and environmental crisis. Owning to the unique perovskite-type structure, tantalate-based semiconductors with unable chemical composition show high activities toward the conversion of solar radiation into chemical energy. Moreover, various engineering strategies, including crystal structure engineering, electronic structure engineering, surface/interface engineering, co-catalyst engineering and so on, have been developed in order to modulate the charge separation and transfer efficiency, optical absorption, band gap position and photochemical and photophysical stability, which would open a realm of new possibilities for exploring novel materials for solar energy applications.