LAUSR

Metal nanocrystals are considered as effective components to enhance the photoelectronic properties of semiconductors. Herein, we report the enhancement of the photoelectronic response and photoelectronic catalysis on Cu2O by forming a Cu nanocrystal layer on its surface via a one-step approach. The photocurrent of Cu2O-rich Cu2O/Cu reaches 190 μA cm−2 in the first run and is about 4 times that of pure Cu2O. The cyclic voltammetry (CV) signal for methanol oxidation with Cu2O/Cu gives a higher methanol oxidation peak current than with that with Cu2O when irradiated by ultraviolet-visible light. The ethanol gas sensing performance of Cu2O-rich Cu2O/Cu hetero-nanocrystals is also investigated. It is shown that the sensitivity of the Cu2O-rich Cu2O/Cu hetero-nanocrystals is higher (4.83) than that of Cu2O nanocrystals (3.87) at an ethanol concentration of 2000 ppm.