We report the stoichiometric evolution of oxygen via water oxidation by irradiating a plasmon-enhanced photocurrent generation system with near-infrared light (λ: 1000 nm), in which gold nanostructures were arrayed on the surface of TiO2 electrode. It is considered that multiple electron holes generated by plasmon-induced charge excitation led to the effective recovery of water oxidation after the electron transfer from gold to TiO2. The proposed system containing a gold nanostructured TiO2 electrode may be a promising artificial photosynthetic system using near-infrared light.
Keywords: gold nanoparticles; surface plasmon resonance; titanium dioxide; water oxidation.