Influence of percentage anatase/rutile TiO₂ in the photocatalytic efficiency synthesized chemically

Titanium dioxide (TiO₂) has been widely studied, having a great interest focused on its photocatalytic property. In this work, the TiO₂ was obtained by an alternate route little explored in the literature consists of adding titanium oxisulfato and hydrogen peroxide in aqueous solution. After decanting, washing and drying the precipitate obtained was thermally treated at different temperatures for obtaining different percentages of rutile phase. The purpose of this research was to evaluate the phase mixture influence in the photocatalytic efficiency of the synthesized material by the new chemical route. The samples were characterized by X-ray diffraction, and subjected to tests for photocatalytic degradation of rhodamine B dye. The results showed that there is an increase in the photocatalytic efficiency for the samples containing a small rutile percentage compared with samples containing pure anatase phase. (author)