Cover Feature: A Copper(II) Molecular Catalyst for Efficient and Selective Photochemical Reduction of CO ₂ to CO in a Water‐Containing System (Chem. Eur. J. 18/2018)

Photochemical reduction of CO2 is very meaningful to relieve the energy crisis and environmental deterioration. A CuII complex shows high catalytic activity for the reduction reaction of CO2 to CO driven by visible light in 4:1 acetonitrile/water (v:v) using [Ru(phen)3](PF6)2 as a photosensitizer and triethanolamine as a sacrificial reductant, with a high TON of 9900 and a high selectivity of 98%. The results of isotope labeling experiments, durable testing and energy dispersive spectroscopy reveal that this CuII complex is robust during the photocatalytic process. More information can be found in the Communication by D.-C. Zhong, T.-B. Lu, et al. on page 4503.