抄録
This review shows our recent studies of water dissociation depending upon oxygen vacancy structures on a TiO2(110) surface. We tried to control the arrangement structure of surface hydroxyl groups on the TiO2(110) surface, and succeeded to form chain structures of surface hydroxyl groups on the surface that had line oxygen vacancies by exposing water at RT. Noncontact atomic force microscopy (NC-AFM) revealed line oxygen vacancies formed by removal of oxygen atoms on a bridge oxygen row of the TiO2(110) surface. In-situ NC-AFM measurements of the surface with the line oxygen vacancies under exposure to water at RT revealed formation of hydroxyl chain structures, which were composed of hydroxyl groups linearly arranged in a form of two rows on the line oxygen vacancies and on the each one side of bridge oxygen row adjacent to the line oxygen vacancy. We concluded that line oxygen vacancies are an active sites for water dissociation.
