Nanocrystalline TiO2 Composite Films for the Photodegradation of Formaldehyde and Oxytetracycline under Visible Light Irradiation

• Main Authors: Min Wei, Xue-Lei Peng, Qi-Sheng Liu, Fang Li, Ming-Ming Yao
• Format: Article
• Language: English
• Published: MDPI AG 2017-06-01
• Series: Molecules
• Subjects: TiO2 film; multi-modification; photodegradation
• Online Access: http://www.mdpi.com/1420-3049/22/6/950

In order to effectively photodegradate organic pollutants, ZnO composite and Co-B codoped TiO2 films were successfully deposited on glass substrates via a modified sol-gel method and a controllable dip-coating technique. Combining with UV–Vis diffuse reflectance spectroscopy (DRS) and photoluminescence spectra (PL) analyses, the multi-modification could not only extend the optical response of TiO2 to visible light region but also decrease the recombination rate of electron-hole pairs. XRD results revealed that the multi-modified TiO2 film had an anatase-brookite biphase heterostructure. FE-SEM results indicated that the multi-modified TiO2 film without cracks was composed of smaller round-like nanoparticles compared to pure TiO2. BET surface area results showed that the specific surface area of pure TiO2 and the multi-modified TiO2 sample was 47.8 and 115.8 m2/g, respectively. By degradation of formaldehyde and oxytetracycline, experimental results showed that the multi-modified TiO2 film had excellent photodegradation performance under visible light irradiation.