Hydrogen produced by electrochemical water splitting is considered a sustainable fuel source, an ideal way to solve the energy problem and its environmental challenges. However, industrial production of hydrogen from...

Chains of alternating semiconductor nanocrystals are complex nanostructures that can offer control over photogenerated charge carriers dynamics and quantized electronic states. We develop a simple one-pot colloidal synthesis of complex Cu 1.94 S-CdS and Cu 1.94 S-ZnS nanochains exploiting an equilibrium driving ion exchange mechanism. The chain length of the heterostructures can be tuned using a concentration dependent cation exchange mechanism controlled by the precursor concentrations, which enables the synthesis of monodisperse and uniform Cu 1.94 S-CdS-Cu 1.94 S nanochains featuring three epitaxial junctions. These seamless junctions enable efficient separation of photogenerated charge carriers, which can be harvested for photocatalytic applications. We demonstrate the superior photocatalytic activity of these noble metal free materials through solar hydrogen generation at a hydrogen evolution rate of 22.01 mmol g −1 h −1 , which is 1.5-fold that of Pt/CdS heterostructure photocatalyst particles.

The global pandemic of COVID-19 is an example of how quickly a disease-causing virus can take root and threaten our civilization. Nowadays, ultrasensitive and rapid detection of contagious pathogens is...

A feasible nanoscale framework of heterogeneous plasmonic materials and proper surface engineering can enhance photoelectrochemical (PEC) water‐splitting performance owing to increased light absorbance, efficient bulk carrier transport, and interfacial charge transfer. This article introduces a new magnetoplasmonic (MagPlas) Ni‐doped Au@FexOy nanorods (NRs) based material as a novel photoanode for PEC water‐splitting. A two stage procedure produces core–shell Ni/Au@FexOy MagPlas NRs. The first‐step is a one‐pot solvothermal synthesis of Au@FexOy. The hollow FexOy nanotubes (NTs) are a hybrid of Fe2O3 and Fe3O4, and the second‐step is a sequential hydrothermal treatment for Ni doping. Then, a transverse magnetic field‐induced assembly is adopted to decorate Ni/Au@FexOy on FTO glass to be an artificially roughened morphologic surface called a rugged forest, allowing more light absorption and active electrochemical sites. Then, to characterize its optical and surface properties, COMSOL Multiphysics simulations are carried out. The core–shell Ni/Au@FexOy MagPlas NRs increase photoanode interface charge transfer to 2.73 mAcm−2 at 1.23 V RHE. This improvement is made possible by the rugged morphology of the NRs, which provide more active sites and oxygen vacancies as the hole transfer medium. The recent finding may provide light on plasmonic photocatalytic hybrids and surface morphology for effective PEC photoanodes.

Melanin nanoparticles are known to be biologically benign to human cells for a wide range of concentrations in a high glucose culture nutrition. Here, we show cytotoxic behavior at high nanoparticle and low glucose concentrations, as well as at low nanoparticle concentration under exposure to (nonionizing) visible radiation. To study these effects in detail, we developed highly monodispersed melanin nanoparticles (both uncoated and glucose-coated). In order to study the effect of significant cellular uptake of these nanoparticles, we employed three cancer cell lines: VM-M3, A375 (derived from melanoma), and HeLa, all known to exhibit strong macrophagic character, i.e., strong nanoparticle uptake through phagocytic ingestion. Our main observations are: (i) metastatic VM-M3 cancer cells massively ingest melanin nanoparticles (mNPs); (ii) the observed ingestion is enhanced by coating mNPs with glucose; (iii) after a certain level of mNP ingestion, the metastatic cancer cells studied here are observed to die—glucose coating appears to slow that process; (iv) cells that accumulate mNPs are much more susceptible to killing by laser illumination than cells that do not accumulate mNPs; and (v) non-metastatic VM-NM1 cancer cells also studied in this work do not ingest the mNPs, and remain unaffected after receiving identical optical energy levels and doses. Results of this study could lead to the development of a therapy for control of metastatic stages of cancer.