(Invited) Simultaneous Use of Electric Fields and Plasmonic Carriers for Catalysis

The visible-light excitation of plasmonic nanostructures is now well known to induce catalytic reactions that are not otherwise observed in the dark. One example we have discovered is the conversion of carbon dioxide to hydrocarbons on gold nanoparticles driven by electron–hole pairs generated by plasmonic excitation. However, conversions driven by plasmonically generated carriers can suffer from thermodynamic and efficiency limits. I will describe how such limits can be overcome by simultaneous use of electric fields and plasmonically generated carriers.