Abstract
Different amounts of phosphorus (P)-doped TiO2 (PDT) nano-powders (P=0–10wt.%) were synthesized by following a new emulsion-based sol-gel (EBSG) route and calcined at 400°C–800°C for 6h. These calcined PDT powders were then thoroughly characterized by means of XRD, XPS, SEM, FT-IR, FT-Raman, DRS, BET surface area, zeta-potential, cyclic-voltammetry and photocatalytic evaluation using methylene blue (MB) as a model-pollutant and established the effects of phosphorous doping on structural, surface, band-gap energy, and photocatalytic characteristics of TiO2 nano-powder formed in EBSG route. The characterization results suggest that the EBSG derived TiO2 nano-powder after calcination at 400°C for 6h is in the form of anatase phase when it was doped with <8wt.% P, and it is in the amorphous state when doped with >8wt.% P. Furthermore, these EBSG derived PDT powders own high negative zeta-potentials, high specific surface areas (up to >250m2/g), and suitable band-gap energies (<3.34eV). Surprisingly, these PDT powders exhibit very high MB adsorption (up to 50%) from its aqueous 0.01mM, 0.02mM and 0.03mM solutions during 30min stirring in the dark, whereas, the commercial Degussa P-25 TiO2 nano-powder shows no adsorption. Among various photocatalysts investigated in this study, the 1wt.% P-doped TiO2 nano-powder formed in EBSG route exhibited the highest photocatalytic activity for MB degradation reaction.
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