Abstract
Titanium dioxide was obtained by hydrolysis of the corresponding ethoxide, followed by washing, drying, and calcination at 80, 160, 240, 320, 400, and 700 °C, respectively. The following surface properties of the solids obtained were determined as a function of the calcinations temperature: TCalcn; area by the BET method; Brønsted acidity by titration with sodium hydroxide; empirical polarity, ET(30); Lewis acidity, αSurf; Lewis basicity, βSurf; and dipolarity/polarizability πSurf*, by use of solvatochromic indicators. Except for βSurf whose value increased slightly, heating the samples resulted in a decrease of all of the above-mentioned surface properties, due to the decrease of surface hydroxyl groups. This conclusion has been corroborated by FTIR. Values of ET(30), αSurf, and πSurf* are higher than those of water and alcohols; the Brønsted and Lewis acidities of the samples correlate linearly. The advantages of using solvatochromic indicators to probe the surface properties and relevance of the results to the applications of TiO2 are discussed.
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