In situ synthesis and photocatalytic hydrogen production of plate‐like Cu‐doped TiO 2 polycrystal with crystal‐axis orientation

Abstract

The Cu-doped TiO2 plate-like particle was synthesised via using the layered H1.07Ti1.73O4·H2O (HTO) plate-like particle as a precursor. The Cu-doped TiO2 particle consists of nanocrystals and holes, and these nanocrystals are oriented at [ 1 ¯ 1 ¯ 1 ]-crystal-axis direction. Firstly, the HTO particle was treated in a copper acetate solution, forming Cu2+-exchanged HTO plate-like particles. And then Cu2+-exchanged HTO in situ transformed into Cu-doped TiO2 via heat-treating and further acid washing. The Cu-doped TiO2 particle has a stronger absorption in the visible light region of 400–800 nm and the visible photocatalytic H2 production activity.