Enhanced Photoelectrochemical Performance of Fe-Doped WO<sub>3</sub> Film Electrode under Visible Light

WO3 and Fe-doped WO3 thin films were prepared on Indium-Tin Oxide (ITO) glass substrates by a dip-coating. The samples were characterized by photoelectrochemistry, scanning electron microscopy (SEM), X-ray diffraction (XRD), and UV-Vis absorption spectroscopy, respectively. The result shows that the doping of Fe influenced absorption performance, and then influenced the catalytic performance. Compared with pure WO3, Fe-doped WO3 exhibited enhanced higher photoelectrochemical(PEC) performance and photocatalytic activity. The effect of doping concentration on the photocurrent was studied. It was found that the photocurrent under visible light displayed the highest values for 2% Fe-WO3 films annealed at 400 °C. The photocatalytic activity of the Fe-doped WO3 was evaluated in the methylene blue(MB) degradation under visible light illumination. The experiments demonstrated that MB could be efficiently degraded using the doped WO3 electrode as the photoanode which showed a higher activity than pure WO3. This provides a novel method for increasing the photon electric conversion efficiency of WO3 thin film electrodes.