Synthesis and characterisation of nitrogen-doped titanate nanotubes
Balázs Buchholcz1, Ákos Kukovecz2,3, Zoltán Kónya1,2
1
MTA-SZTE Reaction Kinetics and Surface Chemistry Research Group, H-6720 Szeged, Rerrich ter 1,
Hungary
2
University of Szeged, Department of Applied and Environmental Chemistry, H-6720 Szeged, Rerrich
ter 1, Hungary
MTA-SZTE “Lendület” Porous Nanocomposites Research Group, H-6720 Szeged, Rerrich ter 1,
Hungary
3
In the past two decades titanate nanotubes have attracted considerable attention from
the materials science community because of their simple synthesis and their fascinating
properties such as large specific surface area and pore volume and high stability with
photocatalytic activity, to name a few.
The doping of the titanate nanotbes with nitrogen can enhance the photocatalytic activity in
the visible light region and protect the stability opposite to the transistion metal ion doped
ones [1].
There are several ways to prepare titanate nanotubes and to dope them with nitrogen.
The most commonly applied process, after the hydrothermal synthesis, [2] is to mix the
titanate with nitrogen containing aqueous solutions. [3]. Another popular method is the heat
treatment of the titanate nanostructures in NH3 flow [4]. We synthetised titanate nanotubes via
hydrothermal method in revolving autoclave followed by nitrogen doping using the thermal
decomposition of urea as ammonia gas source. In this study we prepared samples with
different synthesis times and we investigated the as-prepared samples by XRD, TEM and
HRTEM.
[1] HU, Cheng-Ching; HSU, Tzu-Chien; KAO, Li-Heng. One-step cohydrothermal synthesis
of nitrogen-doped titanium oxide nanotubes with enhanced visible light photocatalytic
activity. International Journal of Photoenergy, 2011, 2012.
[2] KASUGA, Tomoko, et al. Formation of titanium oxide nanotube. Langmuir, 1998, 14.12:
3160-3163.
[3] DONG, Pengyu, et al. Photocatalytic Activity of (B, N)‐Codoped Titanate Nanotubes.
Journal of the American Ceramic Society, 2012.
[4] WANG, Jin, et al. Origin of photocatalytic activity of nitrogen-doped TiO2 nanobelts.
Journal of the American Chemical Society, 2009, 131.34: 12290-12297.