abstract: Titanium oxide (TiO2), an abundant material with high photocatalytic activity and chemical stability is an important candidate for photocatalytic applications. The photocatalytic activity of the TiO2 varies with its phase. In the current project, phase and morphology changes in TiO2 nanotubes were studied using ex-situ and in-situ transmission electron microscopy (TEM). X-ray diffraction and scanning electron microscopy studies were also performed to understand the phase and morphology of the nanotubes. As prepared TiO2 nanotubes supported on Ti metal substrate were amorphous, during the heat treatment in the ex-situ furnace nanotubes transform to anatase at 450 oC and transformed to rutile when heated to 800 oC. TiO2 nanotubes that were heat treated in an in-situ environmental TEM, transformed to anatase at 400 oC and remain anatase even up to 800 oC. In both ex-situ an in-situ case, the morphology of the nanotubes drastically changed from a continuous tubular structure to aggregates of individual nanoparticles. The difference between the ex-situ an in-situ treatments and their effect on the phase transformation is discussed. Metal doping is one of the effective ways to improve the photocatalytic performance. Several approaches were performed to get metal loading on to the TiO2 nanotubes. Mono-dispersed platinum nanoparticles were deposited on the TiO2 nanopowder and nanotubes using photoreduction method. Photo reduction for Ag and Pt bimetallic nanoparticles were also performed on the TiO2 powders. / Dissertation/Thesis / M.S. Materials Science and Engineering 2014

Water splitting through photoelectrochemical reaction is widely regarded as a major method to generate H2 , a promising source of renewable energy to deal with the energy crisis faced up to human being. Efficient exploitation of visible light in practice of water splitting with pure TiO2 material, one of the most popular semiconductor material used for photoelectrochemical water splitting, is still challenging. One dimensional TiO2 nanotubes is highly desired with its less recombination with the short distance for charge carrier diffusion and light-scattering properties. This work is based on TiO2 NTPC electrode by the optimized two-step anodization method from our group. A highly crystalized p-type Cu2O layer was deposited by optimized pulse potentiostatic electrochemical deposition onto TiO2 nanotubes to enhance the visible light absorption of a pure p-type TiO2 substrate and to build a p-n junction at the interface to improve the PEC performance. However, because of the real photocurrent of Cu2O is far away from its theoretical limit and also poor stability in the aqueous environment, a design of rGO medium layer was added between TiO2 nanotube and Cu2O layer to enhance the photogenerated electrons and holes separation, extend charge carrier diffusion length (in comparison with those of conventional pure TiO2 or Cu2O materials) which could significantly increase photocurrent to 0.65 mA/cm2 under visible light illumination (>420 nm) and also largely improve the stability of Cu2O layer, finally lead to an enhancement of water splitting performance.

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Philosophiae Doctor - PhD / This work investigated the synthesis of Al2O3-coated TiO2 nanotubes via the anodisation technique for application in DSCs. TiO2 nanotube arrays with an average length of 15 μm, diameter of 50 nm and wall thickness of 15 nm were synthesised via anodisation using an organic neutral electrolyte consisting of 2 M H2O + 0.15 M NH4F + ethylene glycol (EG) at an applied voltage of 60 V for 6 hours. In addition, scanning electron microscope (SEM) micrographs showed that anodisation at these conditions yields nanotubes with smooth walls and hexagonally shaped, closed bottoms. X-ray diffraction (XRD) patterns revealed that the as-anodised nanotubes were amorphous and as such were annealed at 450 °C for 2 hours in air at atmospheric pressure, which yielded crystalline anatase TiO2 nanotubes. Highresolution transmission electron microscope (TEM) images revealed that the nanotube walls comprised of individual nano-sized TiO2 crystallites. Photoluminescence (PL) spectroscopy showed that the optical properties, especially the bandgap of the TiO2 nanotubes are dependent on the crystallinity, which in turn was dependent on the structural characteristics, such as the wall thickness, diameter and length. The PL measurements were supplemented by Raman spectra, which revealed an increased in the quantum confinement of the optical phonon modes of the nanotubes synthesised at low anodisation voltages, consequently yielding a larger bandgap The annealed nanotubes were then coated with a thin layer of alumina (Al2O3) using a simple sol-gel dip coating method, effectively used to coat films of nanoparticles. Atomic force microscopy (AFM) showed that the average nanotube diameter increased post sol-gel deposition, which suggests that the nanotubes are coated with a layer of Al2O3. This was confirmed with HR-TEM, in conjunction with selected area electron diffraction (SAED) and XRD analyses, which showed the coating of the nanotube walls with a thin layer of amorphous Al2O3 with a thickness between 4 and 7 nm. Ultraviolet-visible (UVvis) absorbance spectra showed that the dye-adsorption ability of the nanotubes are enhanced by the Al2O3 coating and hence is a viable material for solar cell application. Upon application in the DSC, it was found by means of photo-current density – voltage (I – V) measurements that a DSC fabricated with a 15 μm thick layer of bare TiO2 nanotubes has a photon-to-light conversion efficiency of 4.56%, which increased to 4.88% after coating the nanotubes with a layer of alumina. However, these devices had poorer conversion efficiencies than bare and Al2O3-coated TiO2 nanoparticle based DSCs, which boasted with efficiencies of 6.54 and 7.26%, respectively. The low efficiencies of the TiO2 nanotube based DSCs are ascribed to the low surface area of the layer of nanotubes, which yielded low photocurrent densities. Electrochemical impedance spectroscopy (EIS) showed that the electron lifetime in the alumina coated nanotubes are almost 20 times greater than in a bare layer of nanoparticles. In addition, it was also found that the charge transfer resistance at the interface of the TiO2/dye/electrolyte is the lowest for an Al2O3-coated TiO2 layer.

No / The objective of this review is to provide an overview concerning what the authors believe to be the most important photoelectrochemical techniques for the study of semiconductor nanoparticles. After a short historical background and a brief introduction to the area of photoelectrochemistry, the working principles and experimental setups of the various static and dynamic techniques are presented. Experimental details which are of crucial importance for their correct execution are emphasized, and applications of the techniques as found in the recent research literature as applied to semiconductor nanoparticles are illustrated.

<p>Ispitana je kinetika i mehanizam fotokatalitičke&nbsp;razgradnje herbicida kvinmeraka i klomazona u prisustvu&nbsp;UV/TiO₂&nbsp; Degussa P25, odnosno piklorama i&nbsp; klopiralida&nbsp;<br />primenom UV/TiO₂&nbsp; Wackherr pri različitim&nbsp;eksperimentalnim uslovima. Praćena je i kinetika&nbsp;razgradnje odabranih herbicida direktnom fotolizom uz&nbsp;primenu sunčevog, UV i vidljivog zračenja, kao i u&nbsp;odsustvu svetlosti. Pored toga, upoređena je efikasnost&nbsp;<br />UV/TiO₂&nbsp; Degussa P25, odnosno UV/TiO₂&nbsp; Wackherr sa&nbsp;vidljivim zračenjem, kao i direktnom fotolizom u&nbsp;prisustvu pomenutih izvora svetlosti.&nbsp; U cilju procene&nbsp;<br />citotoksičnosti klomazona i klopiralida, kao i sme&scaron;e&nbsp;klomazona i klopiralida i njihovih intermedijera nastalih&nbsp;tokom fotokatalitičke razgradnje ispitan je&nbsp; in vitro&nbsp; rast&nbsp;<br />ćelijskih linija&nbsp; MRC-5 i H-4-II-E.&nbsp; Nakon ispitivanja&nbsp;fotokatalitičke razgradnje odabranih herbicida u dvaput&nbsp;destilovanoj vodi, praćena je njihova razgradnja i u&nbsp;prirodnim vodama. Takođe, ispitan je uticaj dodatka&nbsp;hidrogenkarbonata i huminske kiseline na efikasnost&nbsp;razgradnje odabranih herbicida. Fotokatalitička razgradnja&nbsp;klomazona, piklorama i mekopropa je ispitivana i u&nbsp;prisustvu UV/TiO₂&nbsp; nanocevi. Aktivnost katalizatora TiO_2&nbsp;Wackherr&nbsp; i TiO₂&nbsp; nanocevi je upoređena sa TiO₂&nbsp; Degussa&nbsp;P25.</p> / <p>The kinetics and mechanism of photocatalytic degradation&nbsp;of the herbicides quinmerac and clomazone in the&nbsp;presence of UV/TiO₂&nbsp; Degussa P25, and of picloram and&nbsp;clopyralid using UV/TiO₂&nbsp; Wackherr under different&nbsp;experimental conditions were studied. The kinetics of&nbsp;degradation of selected herbicides by direct photolysis&nbsp;using sunlight, UV and visible radiation, and in the&nbsp;absence of light were followed. In addition, the&nbsp;efficiencies of UV/TiO₂&nbsp; Degussa P25 and UV/TiO_2&nbsp;Wackherr &nbsp;were compared with visible radiation and direct&nbsp;photolysis in the presence of the above mentioned light&nbsp;sources. In order to evaluate the cytotoxicity of clomazone&nbsp;<br />and clopyralid alone and in their mixture with&nbsp;intermediates formed during the photocatalytic&nbsp;degradation, in vitro growth of cell lines, MRC-5 and H-4-II-E was followed. After examining&nbsp; the photocatalytic&nbsp;degradation of selected herbicides in double distilled&nbsp;water, their decomposition in natural waters was also&nbsp;followed. Also, the influence of hydrogencarbonate and&nbsp;humic acid addition on the efficiency of degradation of&nbsp;selected herbicides was studied. Photocatalytic&nbsp;degradations of clomazone, picloram and mecoprop were&nbsp;investigated in the presence of UV/TiO_2&nbsp;nanotubes. Activities of the catalysts TiO₂&nbsp; Wackherr and TiO_2&nbsp;nanotubes were compared to TiO₂ Degussa P25.</p>