• Korean Journal of Crystallography
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• v.6 no.1
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• pp.1-13
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• 1995

Cr:A12O3 and Ti:A12O3 single crystals were grown by Czochralski method, and the effects of crystal growth parameters such as pulling rate, rotation rate, dopant and growth atmosphere on crystal quality were investigated. And spectroscopic properties including lasing efficiency were also measured. Single crystals, sized of 20mm in diameter and 100-135mm in length, were successfully grown from the seed of <001> direction. With the doping level of 0.5w/o Cr2O3, pulling rate 2.0mm/hr, rotation rate of 30rpm and inert atmosphere by nitrogen gas, high quality crystals of Cr:A12O3 were grown. While in case of Ti:A12O3 crystals, high quality crystals were grown under the conditions of the doping level of 0.25w/o TiO2, pulling rate of 1.5mm/hr, rotation rate of 30rpm and reducing atmosphere by hydrogen - nitrogen mixed gas. It was confirmed that Cr3+ ion which maintains its ionoc valence during growth easily de-bubbled than Ti4+ ion which changes its valence, Fe3+ ion also has do-bubbling effect to Ti:A12O3 crystal and the reducing atmosphere by 90% N2 - 10% H2 mixed gas gave effective result on the changing of Ti4+ to Ti3+ and de-bubbling. As a result of spectroscopic measurements of Cr:A12O3 crystal, 4A2 →4F2 and 4F1 absorption transitions and E →4A2(R1) and 2A →4A2(R2) fluorenscence transitions were confirmed. And it was measured that wavelengths of laser R1 and R2 transitions were 696±5nm and 692±5nm respectively, line width of these transitions were 12A, and life-time of fluorenscence was 152μsec. In case of Ti:A12O3 crystals, it was confirmed that absortion transition of 4T2→4E and fluorescence transition of 4E→4T2 with wide range of 650-1050nm was occured. And 147μsec of life-time of fluorescence, 125.4 of figure of merit and 9% of laser efficience were also measured.

• Journal of Korean Society of Environmental Engineers
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• v.33 no.12
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• pp.907-912
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• 2011

Development of visible light responsive photocatalysts is a promising research area to facilitate utilization of solar energy for hydrogen production via photocatalytic water splitting. In this study two groups of samples, nitrogen (N)-doped niobium pentoxide ($Nb_2O_5$) and titanium dioxide ($TiO_2$) ($Nb_2O_5-N$, $HNb_3O_8-N$, $TiO_2-N$) and N-undoped ones ($Nb_2O_5$ and $TiO_2$) were tested. In order to utilize visible light, nitrogen atoms were doped in selected photocatalysts by using urea. A shift of the absorption edges of the Ndoped samples in the visible light region was observed. Under visible light irradiation, N-doped samples were more prominent photocatalytic activities than the N-undoped samples. Specifically, 99.7% of rhodamine B (RhB) was degraded after 60 minutes of visible light irradiation with $TiO_2-N$. Since $TiO_2-N$ shows the highest activity of RhB degradation, it was supposed to generate the highest current response. However, $HNb_3O_8-N$ showed the highest current response ($63.7mA/cm^2$) than $TiO_2-N$. More interestingly, when we compare the hydrogen production, $Nb_2O_5-N$ produced $19.4{\mu}mol/h$ of hydrogen.

• Applied Chemistry for Engineering
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• v.21 no.1
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• pp.29-33
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• 2010

In this study, boron, carbon, nitrogen and fluorine co-doped $TiO_{2}$ photocatalysts using tetraethylammonium tetrafluoroborate (TEATFB) have been prepared by different heat treatment temperatures to decrease the band gap. To explore the visible light photocatalytic activity of the novel low‐zband gap $TiO_{2}$ photocatalyst, the removal of two dyes was investigated, namely, acridine orange and rhodamine B. XRD patterns demonstrate that the samples calcined at temperatures up to $800^{\circ}C$ clearly show anatase peaks. The XPS results show that all the doped samples contain N, C, B and F elements and the doped $TiO_{2}$ shows the shift in the band gap transition down to 2.98 eV as UV-DRS results. In these UV-Vis results, photocatalytic activity of the doped $TiO_{2}$ is 1.61 times better than undoped $TiO_{2}$. Specially, excellent photoactivity results were obtained in the case of samples treated at $700^{\circ}C$.

• 한국신재생에너지학회:학술대회논문집
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• 2010.06a
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• pp.87-87
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• 2010

Photoelectrochemical (PEC) systems are promising methods of producing H2 gas using solar energy in an aqueous solution. The photoelectrochemical properties of numerous metal oxides have been studied. Among them, the PEC systems based on TiO2 have been extensively studied. However, the drawback of a PEC system with TiO2 is that only ultraviolet (UV) light can be absorbed because of its large band gap (3.2 - 3.4 eV). Two approaches have been introduced in order to use PEC cells in the visible light region. The first method includes doping impurities, such as nitrogen, into TiO2, and this technique has been extensively studied in an attempt to narrow the band gap. In comparison, research on the second method, which includes visible light water splitting in molecular photosystems, has been slow. Mallouk et al. recently developed electrochemical water-splitting cells using the Ru(II) complex as the visible light photosensitizer. the dye-sensitized PEC cell consisted of a dye-sensitized TiO2 layer, a Pt counter electrode, and an aqueous solution between them. Under a visible light (< 3 eV) illumination, only the dye molecule absorbed the light and became excited because TiO2 had the wide band gap. The light absorption of the dye was followed by the transfer of an electron from the excited state (S*) of the dye to the conduction band (CB) of TiO2 and its subsequent transfer to the transparent conducting oxide (TCO). The electrons moved through the wire to the Pt, where the water reduction (or H2 evolution) occurred. The oxidized dye molecules caused the water oxidation because their HOMO level was below the H2O/O2 level. Organic dyes have been developed as metal-free alternatives to the Ru(II) complexes because of their tunable optical and electronic properties and low-cost manufacturing. Recently, organic dye molecules containing multi-branched, multi-anchoring groups have received a great deal of interest. In this work, tri-branched tri-anchoring organic dyes (Dye 2) were designed and applied to visible light water-splitting cells based on dye-sensitized TiO2 electrodes. Dye 2 had a molecular structure containing one donor (D) and three acceptor (A) groups, and each ended with an anchoring functionality. In comparison, mono-anchoring dyes (Dye 1) were also synthesized. The PEC response of the Dye 2-sensitized TiO2 film was much better than the Dye 1-sensitized or unsensitized TiO2 films.