AZoM talked to Ailong Li, a postdoctoral researcher at RIKEN, about his research that has developed a green catalyst for the production of hydrogen energy. This could revolutionize efforts to leave fossil fuels behind in the production of clean energy.
Please can you introduce yourself and how you began researching hydrogen production?
My name is Ailong Li, a postdoctoral researcher at RIKEN. I grew up in China and have been working in Japan for about 5 years. I first started working on artificial photosynthesis using titanium oxide (TiO2) as a sunlight absorber. To me, it sounded remarkable to mimic photosynthesis in plants by converting water into protons and oxygen and converting carbon dioxide into fuel using only sunlight.
However, the lack of efficiency of TiO2, which only absorbs UV light from the environment, prompted me to consider a more efficient way…