Our work on 'The effect of UV light pre-treatment on the oxygen activation capacity of Au/TiO2" was selected to be featured as front cover in the latest issue of Catalysis Science & Technology journal (Impact Factor: 5.287). In this paper, the potential for applying UV light pre-treatment to enhance the oxygen activation capacity of Au/TiO2 under ambient conditions was examined. Catalytic formic acid oxidation in an aqueous environment was employed as the test reaction. Pre-illuminating Au/TiO2 with UV light can amplify the catalytic formic acid oxidation rate by up to four times with the degree of enhancement governed by system parameters such as Au loading, pre-illumination time, and initial formic acid loading. X-ray photoelectron spectroscopy, photoluminescence spectroscopy and electrochemical assessment of the Au/TiO2 indicated light pre-illumination invokes photoexcited electron transfer from the TiO2 support to the Au deposits. The work also featured a single-crystal study employing Scanning Tunneling Microscopy coupled with Density Functional Theory calculations.