| Abstract: | This work investigated the influence of silver plasmon and reduced graphene oxide (rGO) on the photoelectrochemical performance (PEC) of ZnO thin films synthesized by the sol-gel method. The physicochemical properties of the obtained photo-anodes were systematically studied by using several characterization techniques. The x-ray diffraction analysis showed that all samples presented hexagonal wurtzite structure with a polycrystalline nature. Raman and energy dispersive x-ray (EDX) studies confirmed the existence of both Ag and rGO in ZnO:Ag/rGO thin films. The estimated grain size obtained from scanning electron microscopy (SEM) analysis decreased with Ag doping, then increased to a maximum value after rGO addition. The UV-vis transmission spectra of the as-prepared ZnO:Ag and ZnO:Ag/rGO thin films have shown a reduction in the visible range with a redshift at the absorption edges. The bandgaps were estimated to be around 3.17 eV, 2.7 eV, and 2.52 eV for ZnO, ZnO:Ag, and ZnO:Ag/rGO, respectively. Moreover, the electrical measurements revealed that the charge exchange processes were enhanced at the ZnO:Ag/rGO/electrolyte interface, accompanied by an increase in the (PEC) performance compared to ZnO and ZnO:Ag photo-anodes. Consequently, the photocurrent density of ZnO:Ag/rGO (0.2 mA·cm-2) was around 4 and 2.22 times higher than photo-anodes based on undoped ZnO (0.05 mA·cm-2) and ZnO:Ag (0.09 mA·cm-2), respectively. Finally, from the flat band potential and donor density, deduced from the Mott-Schottky, it was clear that all the samples were n-type semiconductors with the highest carrier density for the ZnO:Ag/rGO photo-anode. |
