Among various semiconductors, titanium dioxide (TiO2) is the most studied photocatalysts because of its high photocatalytic activity, non-toxicity, low cost and photochemical stability in the reaction conditions. However, the low quantum efficiency, owing to the fast recombination of photo generated hole-electron pairs and limited response to sunlight irradiation because of wide band-gap of TiO2 greatly limited its practical application. On the other hand, multiwalled carbon nanotubes (MCNTs) present an appropriate template for materials with field-emission displays and photocatalytic properties. Thus, a combination of TiO2 and MCNTs could potentially create many active sites yielding increased photocatalytic activity. In this work, we focused on the sonochemical, combined with calcination process for the preparation of TiO2-carbon nanotube composites with different mole ratio of titanium and carbon. Synthesised TiO2-carbon nanotubes exhibit an enormous surface area, which is responsible for the high agglomeration tendency. Therefore, we post functionalized TiO2-carbon nanotubes with enzymatic in situ synthesized soluble aromatic polymers. This enzymatic procedure is based on the direct attack of the sp2 carbon on the MCNT surface through a free radical process, allowing having a certain control of the yield of functionalization without destroying the MCNTs original structure. The bare MCNTs and the functionalized TiO2-carbon nanotube composites were characterized by a range of analytical techniques including Raman, ultraviolet-visible (UV-vis) and X-Ray photoelectron (XPS) spectroscopies, scanning electron microscopy (SEM) and thermogravimetric and differential scanning calorimetry analysis (TGA-DSC). The photocatalytic activity was evaluated toward the degradation of methylene blue in aqueous solution under both UV and visible light irradiation. The results indicated that the soluble aromatic polymers were grafted covalently on the surface of MCNTs successfully, and the functionalized TiO2-carbon nanotube composites exhibit higher aquatic solubility.
B.06 Other
COBISS.SI-ID: 17935638In the contribution we have presented the development and the optimization of the designing the TiO2 hybrids based on combinatorial approaches to both TiO2 structure design and the exploration of TiO2 surface interactions with organic phenolic acids. New findings about the properties, modification and permanent application of inorganic nano-particles such as TiO2 and its hybrids with various organic phenolic compounds have enormous contribution to the enrichments of fundamental knowledge (correlation between reactivity, structure and surface properties) as well as applicable knowledge (introduction of new stable structures and testing methods, and development of new technologies) from this area; and to the development of new nano materials with multi-functional properties.
B.06 Other
COBISS.SI-ID: 17828630