A general soft interface platform for the growth and assembly of hierarchical rutile TiO2 nanorods spheres

In this communication, we demonstrated that the growth and assembly of TiO2 nanorods into hierarchical spheres could be realized on soft interface between water and chloroform in one pot. The synthesis was free of any surfactants or organometallic precursors or ligands. The resulting samples were characterized by X-ray diffraction, scanning electron microscopy, transmission electron microscopy, and high-resolution transmission electron microscopy. We evaluated photocatalytic activity of the hierarchical rutile TiO2 nanorods spheres on degradation of rhodamine B in aqueous solution under simulated solar light. It was found that the activity of the as-prepared TiO2 nanoarchitectures was about twice that of the famous commercial photocatalyst P25. Moreover, our method could be extended to prepare a series of inorganic hierarchical architectures formed through the assembly of nanorods, nanoplates, and nanoprisms on the interface of water/chloroform. This indicates that water and chloroform can provide a general soft interface platform for the growth and assembly of inorganic hierarchical nanoarchitectures.