Fabrication, characterisation and photocatalytic activity of TiO₂ nanorods on boron doped diamond film through hydrothermal method

Abstract

In order to achieve rapid and efficient decomposition of organic pollutants, semiconductor materials with heterostructure are applied because of the effective electron hole pair separation via the interfacial junction. Among the semiconductor materials, TiO₂ and boron doped diamond (BDD) with unique excellent properties are ideal building blocks to form heterojunction structure, which can be used in waste water treatment. In this work, the TiO₂ nanorods (NRs) with different morphology have been deposited on BDD films with a ZnO buffer layer via hydrothermal method. It is demonstrated that the reaction temperature has a great effect on the morphology and crystallinity of the TiO₂ NRs on BDD film. The crystallinity of TiO₂ NRs can be improved by increasing the reaction temperature. Experimentally, it shows that the TiO₂ NRs/ZnO/BDD heterojunction shows enhanced photocatalytic activity with respect to TiO₂ NRs/ZnO and TiO₂ NRs/BDD heterojunctions respectively.

Keywords:

• TiO₂ nanorods
• Boron doped diamond
• Hydrothermal method
• Reaction temperature
• Photocatalytic activity

Acknowledgements

This work was financially supported by the National Natural Science Foundation of China (nos. 51072066 and 11364002), the Ph.D. Programs Foundation of the Ministry of Education of China (no. 20100061110083) and The Natural Science Foundation of Jiangxi with (nos. 20132BAB212004 and 20122BAB202011).