A Possible Mechanism for Solar Hydrogen Production Over Rhodamine B

In the field of photocatalysis, rhodamine B is usually used as a degrading target to evaluate the performance of photocatalyst. Here we find that rhodamine B is a molecular photocatalyst which can drive hydrogen production from water by using triethanolamine as electron donor. A quantum efficiency of 0.084% is attained at 510 nm. A Zn-complex rhodamine B has been synthesized, which exhibits the improved photostability for the hydrogen production from light irradiated water. This simple system is expected to contribute to the development of solar hydrogen production systems that directly use a molecular photocatalyst. A possible mechanism for hydrogen evolution over Rhodamine B is proposed.