A Computational Study of Organic Molecular Crystals for Photocatalytic Water Splitting

Fuente: arXiv
Saved in:
Bibliographic Details
Main Authors: Green, James D., Medranda, Daniel G., Wang, Hong, Cooper, Andrew I., Nelson, Jenny, Jelfs, Kim E.
Format: Preprint
Published: 2026
Subjects:
Online Access:
Tags: Add Tag
No Tags, Be the first to tag this record!
_version_ 1866915809567178752
author Green, James D.
Medranda, Daniel G.
Wang, Hong
Cooper, Andrew I.
Nelson, Jenny
Jelfs, Kim E.
author_facet Green, James D.
Medranda, Daniel G.
Wang, Hong
Cooper, Andrew I.
Nelson, Jenny
Jelfs, Kim E.
contents Organic crystalline materials are potential candidates for photocatalytic overall water splitting (OWS). Although organic crystals have been heavily investigated for application in organic electronics, such as organic light-emitting diodes (OLEDs) and solar cells, there have been comparatively fewer studies into OWS in these materials. A major challenge is the large number of electronic and structural criteria that must be met for a material to make a viable OWS photocatalyst. Optical absorption, reduction and oxidation potentials and charge-transport properties are among the key considerations, and these are influenced both by molecular properties and the solid-state packing arrangement, making computational modelling challenging. Here, we investigate a series of known organic electronic materials that have published crystal structures using periodic density functional theory (DFT) and compare their calculated electronic properties of optical absorption and reduction and oxidation potentials with literature experimental data. Furthermore we perform a series of gas-phase molecular calculations which show a good agreement with literature data and periodic DFT for the optoelectronic properties of the organic molecular crystals studied, showing that gas-phase molecular calculations could be used to screen organic crystals for OWS at a reduced computational cost.
format Preprint
id arxiv_https___arxiv_org_abs_2602_18200
institution arXiv
publishDate 2026
record_format arxiv
spellingShingle A Computational Study of Organic Molecular Crystals for Photocatalytic Water Splitting
Green, James D.
Medranda, Daniel G.
Wang, Hong
Cooper, Andrew I.
Nelson, Jenny
Jelfs, Kim E.
Materials Science
Chemical Physics
Organic crystalline materials are potential candidates for photocatalytic overall water splitting (OWS). Although organic crystals have been heavily investigated for application in organic electronics, such as organic light-emitting diodes (OLEDs) and solar cells, there have been comparatively fewer studies into OWS in these materials. A major challenge is the large number of electronic and structural criteria that must be met for a material to make a viable OWS photocatalyst. Optical absorption, reduction and oxidation potentials and charge-transport properties are among the key considerations, and these are influenced both by molecular properties and the solid-state packing arrangement, making computational modelling challenging. Here, we investigate a series of known organic electronic materials that have published crystal structures using periodic density functional theory (DFT) and compare their calculated electronic properties of optical absorption and reduction and oxidation potentials with literature experimental data. Furthermore we perform a series of gas-phase molecular calculations which show a good agreement with literature data and periodic DFT for the optoelectronic properties of the organic molecular crystals studied, showing that gas-phase molecular calculations could be used to screen organic crystals for OWS at a reduced computational cost.
title A Computational Study of Organic Molecular Crystals for Photocatalytic Water Splitting
topic Materials Science
Chemical Physics
url https://arxiv.org/abs/2602.18200