Water Splitting by Cooperative Catalysis

Pinching water: A mononuclear Ru complex is shown to efficiently split water into H2 and O2 in consecutive steps through a heat- and light-driven process (see picture). Thermally driven H2 formation involves the aid of a non-innocent ligand scaffold, while dioxygen is generated by initial photochemically induced reductive elimination of hydrogen peroxide. These features might be the onset for new designs of catalytic water-splitting systems.