Protective coatings
During the Caltech Ph.D., Pai worked with Prof. Nathan S. Lewis on surface energetics and defects of protective coatings for photoelectrochemical solar fuel devices, including defects on ALD TiO2 coatings and corrosion of GaAs, InP, and Si.
Papers on ALD TiO2 and on GaAs, InP, and Si
Buabthong, P., Ifkovits, Z. P., Kempler, P. A., Chen, Y., Nunez, P. D., Brunschwig, B. S., Papadantonakis, K. M., and Lewis, Nathan S., "Failure modes of protection layers produced by atomic layer deposition of amorphous TiO2 on GaAs anodes." Energy & Environmental Science, (2020), 13, 4269-4279.
Buabthong, P., Evans, J. M., Rinaldi, K. Z., Kennedy, K. M., Fu, H. J., Ifkovits, Z. P., Kuo, T.-J., Brunschwig, B. S., and Lewis, N. S., "GaAs Microisland Anodes Protected by Amorphous TiO2 Films Mitigate Corrosion Spreading During Water Oxidation in Alkaline Electrolytes." ACS Energy Letters, (2021), 6, 3709-3714.
Yu, W., Richter, M. H., Buabthong, P., Moreno-Hernandez, I., Read, C. G., Simonoff, E., Brunschwig, B. S., Lewis, N. S., "Investigations of the stability of etched or platinized p-InP(100) photocathodes for solar-driven hydrogen evolution in acidic or alkaline aqueous electrolytes." Energy & Environmental Science, (2021), 14, 6007-6020.
Fu, H. J., Moreno-Hernandez, I. A., Buabthong, P., Papadantonakis, K. M., Brunschwig, B. S., and Lewis, N. S., "Enhanced stability of silicon for photoelectrochemical water oxidation through self-healing enabled by an alkaline protective electrolyte." Energy & Environmental Science, (2020), 13, 4132-4141.
Fu, H. J., Buabthong, P., Ifkovits, Z. P., Yu, W., Brunschwig, B. S. and Lewis, N. S., "Catalytic open-circuit passivation by thin metal oxide films of p-Si anodes in aqueous alkaline electrolytes." Energy & Environmental Science, (2022), 15, 334-345.
Other work with Prof. Nathan S. Lewis
Yu, W., Buabthong, P., Young, J. L., Ifkovits, Z. P., Byrne, S. T., Steiner, M. A., Deutsch, T. G., Lewis, N. S., "Failure Modes of Platinized pn+-GaInP Photocathodes for Solar-Driven H2 Evolution." ACS Applied Materials & Interfaces, (2022).
Yu, W., Pan, Z., Buabthong, P., Kempler, P. A., Tournet, J., Karuturi, S., "Photoelectrochemical Cells." Photoelectrocatalysis, (2023).