Alkali induced morphology and property improvements of TiO2 by hydrothermal treatment

Alkali induced morphology and property improvements of TiO₂ by hydrothermal reaction were investigated. The products were characterized by SEM, TEM, XRD, TG, EDX, FT-IR and DRS. The results indicate that, with the phase transformation from anatase to rutile, the morphologies changed from high aggregated particles to nanofibers with the diameter of about 100 nm and the length up to several tens of micrometers, meanwhile the process is controllable by manipulating the nature of the alkali, alkalinity and hydrothermal temperature. DRS analysis shows the property improvement of the nanofibers in the UV-Vis light absorption compared with the raw materials, implying the products have potential application in photocatalysis.