Laser-Induced Hydrogen Generation from Methanol with Graphene Aerogel as the Target.

The present work demonstrates a new concept of the efficient generation of hydrogen from methanol by the continuous wave laser diode irradiation of an immersed graphene aerogel (GA) scaffold as the target. It was observed that the process occurred very intensively when it was assisted by bright white light emission in the spot of a laser-irradiated GA scaffold. The yield of hydrogen emission increased exponentially with the applied laser power. The light emission was assisted by the intense production of H ₂ , CH ₄ , and CO gases. It was found that with increasing excitation laser power, the H ₂ generation increased at the expense of CO. It is shown that the volume of CO decreases because of the formation of C ₂ molecules and CO ₂ gases. The mechanism of the laser-driven dissociation of methanol was discussed in terms of the violent ejection of hot electrons from the GA surface as a result of the laser-induced light emission of the graphene target.
Competing Interests: The authors declare no competing financial interest.
(© 2021 The Authors. Published by American Chemical Society.)