A hydrothermal route for constructing reduced graphene oxide/TiO2 nanocomposites: Enhanced photocatalytic activity for hydrogen evolution

A series of reduced graphene oxide/TiO2 (RGO/TiO2) nanowire microsphere composites were synthesized with a facile one-step hydrothermal method using TiCl3 and graphene oxide (GO) as the starting materials, during which the formation of TiO2 and the reduction of GO occur simultaneously. The obtained nanocomposites were characterized with X-ray diffraction, field emission scanning electron microscope, transmission electron microscopy, Raman spectroscopy, Fourier transform infrared spectroscopy, X-ray photoelectron spectroscopy and ultraviolet-visible (UV-vis) diffuse reflectance spectroscopy, respectively. UV-vis absorption spectra showed that the absorption edges of TiO2 were extended into visible light region with the addition of RGO. The photocatalytic activities of the samples with and without Pt as cocatalysts were evaluated by hydrogen evolution from water photo-splitting under UV-vis light illumination. Enhanced photocatalytic properties were observed for the as-prepared RGO/TiO2 nanocomposites. The amount of hydrogen evolution from the optimized photocatalyst reached to 43.8 mu mol h(-1), which was about 1.6 times as high as that of bare TiO2. The results shown here indicate a convenient and applicable approach to further exploitation of high activity materials for photocatalytic water splitting applications. Copyright (C) 2014, Hydrogen Energy Publications, LLC. Published by Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.