Research Projects

Hydrogen production via water splitting is a growing research field due to its importance as a safe and clean fuel source. However, the systematic synergic effect of a composite of metal/magnetic nanoparticles and semiconductors has not been explored. The gaps in research include understanding the role of electric and magnetic fields due to MNPs, harnessing active sites at edges and doped 2D materials-based quantum dots, and understanding the synergic effect in the composite containing a hybrid of metal nanostructures, magnetic nanostructures, and 2D-QDs in solar water splitting. This proposal proposes a nanocomposite of Au nanostars /Cu2O nanoparticle/ hBN Quantum dots as an efficient photocathode. simulation tools such as Quantum Expresso will be used to calculate active sites and bandgap energy, while FDTD simulation will calculate the E and B fields at active sites due to metal and magnetic nanostructures. This will help understand the synergic effect of enhanced E-Field and B-Field for charge separation and charge transfer, leading to enhanced hydrogen generation. The objectives include synthesizing individual nanoparticles, characterizing synthesized nanomaterials for shape, sizes, and optical properties, preparing and measuring thin films of hybrid nanomaterial powders, measuring overpotential, tafel slope, and electrochemical impedances for Nyquist plot, analyzing the evolved hydrogen after water splitting, and filing a patent for the Au-Nano stars /Cu2O NPs/ hBN QDs photocathode design and publication of results in reputed journals.