Light Activated Electrochemistry

A flat, unstructured silicon electrode modified with an organic self-assembled monolayer (SAM) with a single ohmic contact is used in the light-activated electrochemistry (LAE) approach to spatially resolve electrochemistry. The three prerequisites for light-activated electrochemistry are that the redox couple must be covalently attached to the electrode, the semiconducting electrode must be biassed into depletion at the redox potential of the species of interest, and the silicon must be protected from oxidation with a self-assembled monolayer (SAM). It is possible to "switch on" faradaic electrochemistry at a monolayer shielded monolithic silicon electrode with micron scale resolution at any position by merely shining light there. This is known as light-activated electrochemistry.