Principles and applications of photothermal catalysis

Solar energy provides an alternative, sustainable, and clean source of energy to meet the global energy demands without extra carbon emissions. However, the utilization efficiency of sunlight via most traditional photocatalytic processes remains relatively low. Photothermal catalysis, combining the advantages of photocatalysis and thermocatalysis, has emerged as a new fast-growing research area. In this review, we first discuss three different mechanisms of photothermal effects and then describe the functioning principles of photothermal catalysis. We categorize the photothermal catalysts into three types based on their specific coupling modes of thermochemical and photochemical pathways. We also illustrate the catalyst design strategies and characterization methods for photothermal catalysis. As specific examples of applications, we summarize the recent research progress on the photothermal catalytic reactions for CO2 conversion, CH4 activation, NH3 synthesis, and water splitting. Last, we present the challenges and perspectives in this field, as a guide for future development in photothermal catalysis.