The urgent need for clean and storable energy drives many currently topical areas of materials research. Among the many materials under investigation zinc oxide is one of the most studied in relation to its use in photo-(electro)chemical applications. This study aims to give an overview of some of the main challenges associated with the use of zinc oxide for these applications: the high density of intrinsic defects which can lead to fast recombination, low visible light absorption and the occurrence of photo-corrosion. Employing simple low-temperature solution based methods; it is shown how defect-engineering can be used to increase the photo-electrochemical performance and how doping can strongly increase the visible light absorption of zinc oxide nanorod-arrays. Furthermore the deposition of ultra-thin titanium dioxide layers using atomic layer deposition is investigated as possible route for the protection of zinc oxide against photo-corrosion.

中文翻译：

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ZnO纳米棒阵列作为光（电）化学材料：旨在克服材料的自然局限性的策略

清洁和可存储能源的迫切需求推动了许多当前材料研究领域的发展。在研究中的许多材料中，氧化锌是与其在光（电）化学应用中的使用有关的研究最多的材料之一。这项研究旨在概述与在这些应用中使用氧化锌相关的一些主要挑战：高密度的固有缺陷，这些缺陷会导致快速复合，低可见光吸收和发生光腐蚀。采用简单的基于低温溶液的方法；它显示了如何使用缺陷工程技术来提高光电化学性能，以及如何掺杂可以显着提高氧化锌纳米棒阵列的可见光吸收率。