Electrospun Ti-doped haematite fibres and their properties
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RESEARCH PAPER
Electrospun Ti-doped haematite fibres and their properties Marko Robić & Mira Ristić & Marijan Marciuš & Stjepko Krehula & Svetozar Musić
Received: 20 July 2020 / Accepted: 16 November 2020 # Springer Nature B.V. 2020
Abstract Electrospun Ti-doped α-Fe2O3 fibres were synthesized and their properties compared with electrospun α-Fe2O3 and TiO2 fibres as reference samples. All samples were characterized with FE SEM (field emission scanning electron microscopy), XRD (X-ray diffraction), 57Fe Mössbauer, FT-IR (Fourier transform infrared) and UV/Vis/NIR (ultraviolet/visible/near infrared) techniques. Ti-doped α-Fe2O3 fibres consisted of the interconnected nanoparticles. These fibres showed a hollow substructure. XRD and 57Fe Mӧssbauer spectroscopy showed the titanium cations to be incorporated up to 10 mol% into the α-Fe2O3 crystal structure. The incorporation of titanium cations into the α-Fe2O3 crystal structure caused changes in the corresponding FT-IR spectra. The band gap values of the electrospun fibres were determined and the photocatalytic degradation of rhodamine B (RhB) with the same fibres was investigated.
Keywords Ti-doped α-Fe2O3 . Electrospinning . FE SEM . XRD . Spectroscopy . Photocatalysis . Nanocomposites M. Robić : M. Ristić : M. Marciuš : S. Krehula : S. Musić (*) Division of Materials Chemistry, Rudjer Bošković Institute, P. O. Box 180, HR-10002 Zagreb, Croatia e-mail: [email protected] S. Musić Croatian Academy of Sciences and Arts, Zrinski trg 11, HR-10000 Zagreb, Croatia
Introduction In the last two decades, a significant number of investigations appeared with the aim to find best materials for photoelectrochemical (PEC) water splitting or photocatalytic decontamination of polluted water. Haematite (αFe2O3) was selected as a potential material for these applications due to several advantages. It has a suitable band gap value (~ 2.1 to 2.2 eV) and can absorb a large portion of the visible solar spectrum. Moreover, haematite is characterized by good chemical stability over a broad pH range in the aqueous medium, nontoxicity and a relatively low cost. Naturally occurring haematite can also be used as a photocatalyst, due to its abundance in nature. However, synthetic haematites showed the best results in the photocatalytic activity. Ti-doped α-Fe2O3 was investigated as a promising photoanode in photoelectrochemical water splitting. Wang et al. (2018) used the hydrothermal method combined with thermal annealing to prepare α-Fe2O3 and Ti-doped α-Fe2O3 nanorod arrays on FTO (fluorinedoped tin oxide) glass. A similar investigation was conducted by Su et al. (2016). It was also found that Ti-doped α-Fe2O3 coated with Ni(OH)2 (Li et al. 2015) or InOOH (Zhang et al. 2020) enhanced the PEC (photoelectrochemical) activity of these materials. Yang et al. (2014a) prepared the arrays of Ti-doped α-Fe2O3 particles on undoped α-Fe2O3 as a layer on the FTO substrate. β-FeOOH-branched nanorods were orthogonal onto the Ti-doped Fe2O3 surface. Mazzaro et al. (2019) reported a possible utilisation of Ti
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