Plasmonic Cavity-Catalysis by Standing Hot Carrier Waves.

ABSTRACT

Manipulating active sites of catalysts is crucial but challenging in catalysis science and engineering. Beyond the design of the composition and structure of catalysts, the confined electromagnetic field in optical cavities has recently become a promising method for catalyzing chemical reactions via strong light-matter interactions. Another form of confined electromagnetic field, the charge density wave in plasmonic cavities, however, still needs to be explored for catalysis. Here, we present an unprecedented catalytic mode based on plasmonic cavities, called plasmonic cavity-catalysis. We achieve direct control of catalytic sites in plasmonic cavities through standing hot carrier waves. Periodic catalytic hotspots are formed because of localized energy and carrier distribution and can be well tuned by cavity geometry, charge density, and excitation angle. We also found that the catalytic activity of the cavity mode increases several orders of magnitude compared with conventional plasmonic catalysis. We ultimately demonstrate that the locally concentrated long-lived hot carriers in the standing wave mode underlie the formation of the catalytic hotspots. Plasmonic cavity-catalysis provides a new approach to manipulate the catalytic sites and rates and may expand the frontier of heterogeneous catalysis.