Enhanced photocatalytic degradation of tetramethylammonium on silica-loaded titania

Abstract

Photocatalytic degradation (PCD) of tetramethylammonium (TMA) in water was studied using both pure TiO₂ and silica-loaded TiO₂ (Si–TiO₂). Use of Si–TiO₂ catalyst prepared from commercial TiO₂ powder by a simple method developed in this work enhanced the PCD rate of TMA considerably. The Si/Ti atomic ratio of 18% was found to be an optimum in photoactivity and the calcined sample was more efficient than the uncalcined one. Several factors were noted to be responsible for the higher photoefficiency of Si–TiO₂ catalyst. Si–TiO₂ calcined at 700 °C did not show any sign of change in the crystalline structure from that of uncalcined pure TiO₂. The increased thermal stability of Si–TiO₂ enabled the bulk defects to be removed at high temperatures without forming the inactive rutile phase, which may partly contribute to the higher photoactivity. The most outstanding characteristics of Si–TiO₂ is its surface charge modification. Loading silica on to a titania surface made the surface charge highly negative, which was confirmed by zeta potential measurements. The enhanced electrostatic attraction of cationic TMA onto the negatively charged Si–TiO₂ surface seems to be the main reason for the enhanced photoactivity of Si–TiO₂. As a result of this surface charge change, the TMA PCD rate with Si–TiO₂ exhibited a maximum around pH 7 whereas the PCD with pure TiO₂ was minimized at pH 7. The X-ray photoelectron spectroscopic analysis showed the formation of SiO_x on the TiO₂ surface but the diffuse reflectance UV spectra indicated no significant difference in the band gap transition between pure TiO₂ and Si–TiO₂. In addition, the diffuse reflectance IR spectra showed the presence of more surface OH groups on Si–TiO₂ than on pure TiO₂, which may also contribute to the higher photoactivity of Si–TiO₂ through generating more OH radicals upon UV illumination.