Photocatalysis: Fundamentals and Perspectives
CHAPTER 9: Interplay Between Physical and Chemical Events in Photoprocesses in Heterogeneous Systems
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Published:17 Mar 2016
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Alexei V. Emeline, Vladimir K. Ryabchuk, Vyacheslav N. Kuznetsov, Nick Serpone, 2016. "Interplay Between Physical and Chemical Events in Photoprocesses in Heterogeneous Systems", Photocatalysis: Fundamentals and Perspectives, Jenny Schneider, Detlef Bahnemann, Jinhua Ye, Gianluca Li Puma, Dionysios D Dionysiou, Jenny Schneider, Detlef Bahnemann, Jinhua Ye, Gianluca Li Puma, Dionysios D Dionysiou
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Photophysical and photochemical processes in heterogeneous systems have been studied both intensively and extensively for many decades since the pioneering studies of Terenin and DeBeur in the early 1930s.1,2 The reason for such attention is quite simple: our world is a world of interfaces constantly exposed to the action of light. Consequently, numerous photostimulated processes in various natural and artificial heterogeneous systems play a very important role in our life starting from the origin of life and production of biomass as a result of natural photosynthesis to the problems of photosensitivity and/or photoresistance of modern materials, formation of self-cleaning surfaces, and environmental protection among others. As a fundamental and applied (technological) field of science, heterogeneous photochemistry and the related heterogeneous photocatalysis have attracted considerable attention from the chemical community in recent decades3–8 in the belief that they can resolve some of the problems connected, for example, with the chemical transformation and storage of solar energy, with environmental issues on the purification of water and air, with the artificial photosynthesis of important chemical products, and with the production of modern materials. Of particular interest is heterogeneous photocatalysis, principally because of the promising advantages that would result from the combination of photochemistry and heterogeneous catalysis.