Titania Nanotubes Prepared by Chemical Processing

TLDR: In this paper, a method for the synthesis of needle-shaped titanium oxide (TiO2) nanotubes was proposed. But the method was not suitable for the case of amorphous raw materials, and it required the use of distilled water and HCl aqueous solution.

Abstract: We report a new method for the synthesis of titanium oxide (TiO2) nanotubes. When anatase-phase- or rutile-phase-containing TiO2 was treated with an aqueous solution of 5–10 M NaOH for 20 h at 110 °C and then with HCl aqueous solution and distilled water, needle-shaped TiO2 products were obtained (diameter ≈ 8 nm, length ≈ 100 nm). The needle-shaped products are nanotubes with inner diameters of approximately 5 nm and outer diameters of approximately 8 nm. The formation mechanism of titania nanotubes is discussed in terms of the detailed observation of the products by transmission electron microscopy: the crystalline raw material is first converted to an amorphous product through alkali treatment, and subsequently, titania nanotubes are formed after treatment with distilled water and HCl aqueous solution.