electron Dynamics in Nanostructured Functional Oxides | e-DyNaFOx

The aim of the project is understanding fundamental processes induced by absorption of light in two key materials used in photocatalysis: Cu₂O and Ti-modified α-Fe₂O₃.

Methods

• advanced materials growth by physical methods to obtain films with variable thickness and controlled and graded doping, size-selected NPs, plasmonic-core @ oxide-shell NPs
• frontier experimental studies of photo-excited charge dynamics in the time domain ranging from fs to ns
• characterization of the photoelectrochemical functionality

Expected results

• Identification of optimal architectures for effective and stable photoanode and photocathode materials;
• Description of photoexcitation and charge transfer pathways in the identified materials.

Duration: two years 04/02/2025-03/02/2027

Funder: Italian Ministry of University and Research  – Decreto Segretario Generale n. 1401 del 18 settembre 2024 per lo scorrimento delle graduatorie a valere sui progetti del Bando PRIN 2022 (Decreto Direttoriale n.104 del 2 febbraio 2022).

Research Units

CNR Unit, involving two sub-units

CNR-Nano hosts two experimental chambers for physical synthesis and steady state characterization of nanostructured systems. A reactive MBE chamber is used for the growth of oxide films and self-assembled NPs and for in-situ XPS/UPS, LEED and STM/AFM characterization. A second chamber hosts a magnetron sputtering based inert gas aggregation cluster source for the growth of mass-selected NPs, MBE evaporators and an XPS spectrometer. The Unit also hosts a UV-Vis spectrometer, and it has access to TEM. (https://green.nano.cnr.it/metal-oxide/).

CNR-ISM will provide access to the EFSL to perform time-resolved investigations of the optical and photocatalytic properties of developed materials by pump-probe transient absorbance/reflectance and photoluminescence in a temporal range 50 fs to tens of ns, 240-10000 nm.  The samples can be studied at RT and low temperature as well as under in-operando conditions with a bias applied to the photoelectrode. EFSL is also equipped with a HHG source for TR-XAS in the 18-90 eV energy range with 100 fs temporal resolution. (http://efsl.ism.cnr.it/it/).

Università di Bologna | UNIBO Unit, involving the FERMI sub-Unit
The UNIBO Unit hosts a chamber for magnetron sputtering growth and one for inert gas evaporation for NPs. The unit also has extensive experience in PEC measurement. It also has axcess to a range of in-house characterization methods, including SEM, XRD, UV-VIS, AFM, TEM and PEC measurements. (https://www.unibo.it/sitoweb/luca.pasquini/ricerca).

People

Paola Luches – CNR-Nano
Patrick O’Keeffe – CNR-ISM 
Stefano Turchini – CNR-ISM
Luca Pasquini – UniBO 
Francesco Borgatti – CNR-ISMN (affiliated to UNIBO Unit) 

News and events

•  March 13^th 2025: Kick-off meeting of the e-DYNAFOX Project. The initial activities and tasks have been discussed among the project partners.

Address

Cnr Nano | via Campi 213/A -41125 Modena