Proceedings of MATSUS Fall 2026 Conference (MATSUSFall26)
Publication date: 22nd July 2026
Photocatalytic CO2 reduction is known to be enhanced on surfaces containing defects such as oxygen vacancies (Vₒ), undercoordinated metal atoms, and hydroxyl groups (OH⁻). This enhancement can be further promoted when these defects, Vₒ-coupled undercoordinated metal atoms, and nearby OH⁻ groups act synergistically. However, establishing atomic-level arrangements of such structural motifs and elucidating their activation and deactivation pathways remains challenging. Herein, we report single-atom hydroxylated Cu in the vicinity of Ti atoms, which promotes Vₒ generation through specific structural arrangements. The resulting active sites facilitate CO2 activation through coordinative interactions and ultimately drive its conversion to CH4 via a Cu–*CHO intermediate. Concurrently, photocatalyst deactivation occurs, accompanied by changes in the Cu binding environment, formation of oxidizing hydroxyl radicals, and accumulation of photocatalytically inactive carbonaceous species. This work highlights the effective role of Cu in photocatalytic CO2 reduction to CH4 and provides insights into the associated catalyst activation and deactivation mechanisms.
The authors thankfully acknowledge the financial support of InnoCORE program of the Ministry of Science and ICT (26-InnoCORE-03 and 1.260005.01) and Olle Engkvist Foundation, Sweden (31002715). The authors also acknowledge the support of Finnish Computational Centre for Science (CSC) for computational resources, the Pohang Accelerator Laboratory (PAL) for EXAFS experiments at the BL10C beamline, and the University of Oulu & the Research Council of Finland Profi 352788. J.Y., thanks for the financial support from the European Research Council (ERC) Consolidator Grant with the grant number of PARIS-101043485.
nanoGe is a prestigious brand of successful science conferences that are developed along the year in different areas of the world since 2009. Our worldwide conferences cover cutting-edge materials topics like perovskite solar cells, photovoltaics, optoelectronics, solar fuel conversion, surface science, catalysis and two-dimensional materials, among many others.
Previously nanoGe Spring Meeting (NSM) and nanoGe Fall Meeting (NFM), MATSUS is a multiple symposia conference focused on a broad set of topics of advanced materials preparation, their fundamental properties, and their applications, in fields such as renewable energy, photovoltaics, lighting, semiconductor quantum dots, 2-D materials synthesis, charge carriers dynamics, microscopy and spectroscopy semiconductors fundamentals, etc.
International Conference on Hybrid and Organic Photovoltaics
International Conference on Hybrid and Organic Photovoltaics (HOPV) is celebrated yearly in May. The main topics are the development, function and modeling of materials and devices for hybrid and organic solar cells. The field is now dominated by perovskite solar cells but also other hybrid technologies, as organic solar cells, quantum dot solar cells, and dye-sensitized solar cells and their integration into devices for photoelectrochemical solar fuel production.
Asia-Pacific International Conference on Perovskite, Organic Photovoltaics and Optoelectronics
The main topics of the Asia-Pacific International Conference on Perovskite, Organic Photovoltaics and Optoelectronics (IPEROP) are discussed every year in Asia-Pacific for gathering the recent advances in the fields of material preparation, modeling and fabrication of perovskite and hybrid and organic materials. Photovoltaic devices are analyzed from fundamental physics and materials properties to a broad set of applications. The conference also covers the developments of perovskite optoelectronics, including light-emitting diodes, lasers, optical devices, nanophotonics, nonlinear optical properties, colloidal nanostructures, photophysics and light-matter coupling.
The International Conference on Perovskite Thin Film Photovoltaics Perovskite Photonics and Optoelectronics (NIPHO) is the best place to hear the latest developments in perovskite solar cells as well as on recent advances in the fields of perovskite light-emitting diodes, lasers, optical devices, nanophotonics, nonlinear optical properties, colloidal nanostructures, photophysics and light-matter coupling.