Titanate nanowire as a precursor for facile morphology control of TiO2 catalysts with enhanced photocatalytic activity

Titanate nanowire has been explored as a precursor for the preparation of TiO2 catalysts with controllable morphologies by a facile hydrothermal method with HF and urea as assistants. During the hydrothermal process, HF erodes the titanate nanowires to form TiF62- ions, and urea generates OH- in situ to initiate the hydrolysis of TiF62-. The morphology of TiO2 products can be tuned by simply adjusting the experimental parameters, such as the amounts of HF and urea, reaction time, reaction temperature and the concentration of titanate precursor. The photocatalytic activity of TiO2 catalysts with different morphologies were evaluated by the photocatalytic degradation of Rhodamine B (RhB) and methyl orange (MO). The experimental results have demonstrated that catalysts with different morphologies have different photocatalytic activities. Along with many advantages of the synthesis process, such as being surfactant-free and easy to operate, the synthesis method developed in this study provides a new inspiration for further investigation into the preparation of TiO2 catalysts with advanced structures and high photocatalytic activity. (C) 2016 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.