Effect of Nb doping on the hydrophilicity of TiO2 thin films

Authors

Aida Rudakova¹ , Tair Bakiev¹ , Alyona Mikheleva¹ , Alexei Emeline¹ , Kirill Bulanin¹

1. Laboratory “Photoactive nanocomposite materials”, Saint Petersburg State University

Conference / event

8th Asian Symposium on Advanced Materials - ASAM-8, July 2023 (Novosibirsk, Russian Federation)

Poster summary

A series of Nb-doped films were prepared with niobium content from 0.0 to 1.0 at.%. The chemical and phase composition and surface morphology of the synthesized films were characterized by XRD, XPS, AFM, EDX and SEM methods. No additional micro-strain was detected in the doped films compared to the undoped film. Nb doping affects the SFE and hydrophilicity of the film surface as well as surface acidity and the work function of x-Nb-TiO2. With Nb dopant content increasing, Lewis acidity of the x-Nb-TiO2 surface increases while Brønsted acidity decreases. The work function values deal with electron concentration on the surface as well as the composition of the hydroxyl-hydrated layer. Photoexcitation of films in the TiO2 intrinsic absorption region leads to the superhydrophilicity. The initial photoinduced hydrophilic/hydrophobic conversion rate at irradiation for seconds correlate with the surface resistivity: the lower the surface resistivity, the greater the positive rate value.

Keywords

Metal doping, Photounduced hydrophilicity, Titanium dioxide, Niobium, Work function, Surface free energy

Research areas

Material Sciences, Nanoengineering, Chemistry, Environmental Sciences, Physics

References

1. R. Wang, K. Hashimoto, A. Fujishima, et al., Nature 388 (1997) 431. doi: 10.1038/41233
2. A.V. Rudakova, A.V. Emeline, Colloid J. 83 (2021), 20. doi: 10.1134/S1061933X21010105
3. G.A. Parks, P.L. de Bruyn, J. Phys. Chem. 66 (1962), 967–973. doi: 10.1021/j100812a002
4. D.K. Owens, R.C. Wendt, J. Appl. Polym. Sci. 13 (1969), 1741–1747. doi:10.1002/app.1969.070130815

Funding

1. Russian Science Foundation (No. 23-22-00161)

Supplemental files

No data provided

Additional information

Competing interests

No competing interests were disclosed.

Data availability statement

The datasets generated during and / or analyzed during the current study are available from the corresponding author on reasonable request.

Creative Commons license

Copyright © 2023 Rudakova et al. This is an open access work distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License, which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited.