Electrophoretic deposition of antimonene for photoelectrochemical applications

Antimonene is a recently developed two-dimensional material with outstanding expected physical properties based on theoretical calculations. Liquid phase-exfoliation has become the most straight forward preparation method to produce stable antimonene suspensions. However, the processing and deposition on substrates of antimonene is still required towards its exploitation in various fields, as current challenges in this research area. Despite the high current research interest in antimonene, the fabrication of Sb-films and its utilization in photoelectrochemical devices remains still unexplored. Herein, the electrophoretic deposition of antimonene on different substrates and its activity as absorber and hole acceptor layer in photoelectrochemical cell (PEC) is reported. The obtained results confirm that the photoelectrochemical performance of the antimonene films electrophoretically deposited on titanium dioxide exhibits an enhanced optical absorption and charge separation properties, compared to pristine TiO₂ films. Furthermore, electrochemical measurements reveal that the antimonene films act as hole acceptor layers, enabling better PEC performance.