Effect of Sulfate Pretreatment on Gold-Modified TiO2 for Photocatalytic Applications

The influence of sulfated pretreatment of TiO2 on the structure, morphology, and dispersion of gold and photocatalytic properties of Au/TiO2 were studied. Notable enhancements in the photocatalytic activity of TiO2 were achieved by deposition of gold onto samples that had previously undergone sulfate treatment followed by high temperature calcination. The enhancement in activity can be attributed to the stronger bonding and improved electronic communication between gold particles and TiO2 on defect rich surfaces as are found on sulfated samples after calcination at 700 degrees C. Two different methods for gold deposition were evaluated: chemical reduction by citrate and photodeposition. The citrate method produced more homogeneous and smaller gold particles with a better dispersion than photodeposition, which lead to greater increases in activity in the photocatalytic degradation of phenol when the former method was used for deposition on both sulfated and nonsulfated TiO2. The combination of sulfate pretreatment and gold deposition by chemical reduction was shown to be a. good strategy to obtain gold/titania catalysts possessing homogeneous particle size and dispersion of the metal and a strong bonding between the Au and the TiO2 surface.