Enhanced electrical and photocatalytic properties of porous TiO 2 thin films decorated with Fe 2 O 3 nanoparticles
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Enhanced electrical and photocatalytic properties of porous TiO2 thin films decorated with Fe2O3 nanoparticles Zoubaida Landolsi1,2, Ibtissem Ben Assaker1,* , Daniela Nunes3, Elvira Fortunato3, Rodrigo Martins3, Radhouane Chtourou1, and Salah Ammar1,4 1
Nanomaterials and Systems for Renewable Energy Laboratory, Research and Technology Center of Energy, Technoparc Borj Cedria, BP 095 Hammam Lif, Tunisia 2 Faculty of Sciences of Bizerte, Carthage University, Tunis, Tunisia 3 i3N/CENIMAT, Department of Materials Science, Faculty of Sciences and Technology, Universidade NOVA de Lisboa and CEMOP/ UNINOVA, Campus de Caparica, 2829-516 Caparica, Portugal 4 Faculty of Sciences of Gabes, Gabes University, Gabes, Tunisia
Received: 21 April 2020
ABSTRACT
Accepted: 1 October 2020
In this work, we developed a facile synthetic process for the fabrication of porous heterojunction Fe2O3/TiO2 using a two-step method to be employed as a visible light photocatalyst. In the first step, porous TiO2 thin films were successfully prepared by a sol–gel method using polyethylene glycol (PEG). The porous TiO2 thin film was further annealed and then decorated with nanoparticles of Fe2O3 using the direct electrodeposition method. The photocatalysts were structurally investigated by scanning electron microscopy (SEM), atomic force microscopy (AFM), X-ray diffraction (XRD) and Raman spectroscopy. The Fe2O3/TiO2 heterojunction presented both an anatase TiO2 phase and rhombohedric structure of hematite a-Fe2O3. The optical properties have been investigated for all the materials, in which the TiO2 material present in porous heterojunction exhibited a remarkable absorption and red shift in the visible region from 3.2 to 3.0 eV compared to the pure heterojunction Fe2O3/TiO2. Moreover, the electrochemical behavior of the samples was investigated. Photocatalytic activity was assessed from methylene blue degradation with remarkable degradability performance under visible light. The photodegradation of the porous heterojunction Fe2O3/TiO2 exhibited an enhanced photodegradation up to 70% after 150 min of irradiation.
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https://doi.org/10.1007/s10854-020-04588-w
J Mater Sci: Mater Electron
1 Introduction Heterogeneous photocatalyst is one of the best, renewable, and green technologies to avoid water pollution problems. Since the discovery of Fujishima and Honda, titanium dioxide has been proven to be the most efficient photocatalyst and photoanode for water splitting, CO2 conversion and degradation of dangerous contaminants in both gaseous and aqueous systems thanks to its durability, no toxicity, high photoactivity and negative conduction band potential [1–6]. However, the performance of titanium dioxide (TiO2) was limited by its large intrinsic bandgap (Eg = 3.2 eV), fast recombination of photogenerated charges and narrow light response of the solar spectrum in the UV region (4–5%). In order to improve these propert
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