Preparation of inverse opal titanium dioxide for photocatalytic performance research

Abstract

Inverse opal structure materials, with three-dimensional periodic structure and excellent optical properties, have been widely studied in many fields. In this study, visible light-driven inverse opal titanium dioxide photocatalysts were successfully fabricated via sol-gel method cooperating opal template. The surface morphology, chemical composition, crystal phase, optical absorption, optical reflectance and separation of charge carries of samples were symmetrically investigated by SEM, EDS, XRD, UV–vis DRS, UV-Raman and PL. It was found that such the structure existed electronic band gap and photonic band gap. Meanwhile, slow photon effect and larger specific surface area, reduced combination rate of photo-generated electron-hole pairs were certified. All of these properties contributed to promoting the photocatalytic redox activity of RhB degradation. Among the inverse opal TiO2 samples, IOT-610 fabricated by polystyrene microsphere opal template with the diameter of 610 nm had the best photocatalytic performance, showing 3.2 times higher than that of conventional TiO2. The results indicated that inverse opal structure photocatalyst is a preferential option for photocatalytic degradation of various environmental contaminants.