Functionalization of cotton fabrics with plasmonic photo-active nanostructured Au-TiO2 layer. (15th November 2017) - Abid, M.
Highlights: Procedure for the functionalization of cotton fabrics with heterostructures of TiO2 and gold nanoparticles. The system was fully characterized both spectroscopically and microscopically. Photocatalytic activity was evaluated through the degradation of RB. Small amount of Au NPs was enough to boost the photocatalytic activity under visible light. Photocatalytic efficiency increases with increase of Au loading. Abstract: A simple approach to functionalize cotton fabrics with Au and TiO2 nanostructured layer is presented. Hybrid fabrics (Cot-Au-TiO2 ) are prepared through reduction of AuCl4 − on cotton, followed by a non-aqueous sol-gel procedure using tetrabutyltitanate and a hydrothermal treatment at 110 °C. The generation of crystalline TiO2 is confirmed by Raman spectroscopy. The fibres morphology and their roughness are characterized by AFM and FE-SEM. XPS shows how the concentration of the NPs precursors (Au and TiO2 ) affects the layer composition. GSDR (Ground State Diffuse Reflectance Absorption Spectroscopy) and LIL (Laser induced luminescence) reveal a strong quenching effect induced by Au NPs. Photocatalytic activity measured through the Remazol Blue (RB) degradation reveals an enhancement under visible light, which increases with Au loading. This strong enhancement is explained through the surface plasmon resonance brought by Au NPs.