Influence of N-doping on the structure and electronic properties of titania nanoparticle photocatalyst

S. J. STEWART; M. FERNANDEZ-GARCIA; C. BELVER; S. B. MUN; F. G. REQUEJO

JOURNAL OF PHYSICAL CHEMISTRY B

American Chemical Society Publications

Año: 2006 vol. 110 p. 16482 - 16486

1089-5647

N-containing TiO2-based nanostructured materials (average particle size _10 nm) with an anatase-type structurewere investigated using oxygen (O) K-edge and titanium (Ti) K- and L-edge X-ray absorption near-edge spectroscopy (XANES). The Ti K pre-edge features indicate that samples predominantly contain [6]Ti with some [5]Ti, and there is no evidence for [4]Ti. We observed that those samples with a larger fraction of Ti in a fivefold coordination, that is, with a significant number of oxygen vacancies, also present a modified Ti environment at the medium-range scale. The presence of these defects drastically modifies the electronic electronics and photocatalytic activity.