Hierarchical flower-like nanostructures of anatase TiO₂ nanosheets dominated by {001} facets

Hierarchical nanostructures of anatase TiO₂ with high specific surface area are specially significant in various applications. In this work, we using a one-pot, template-free method that employed ethanol as mild solvent and obtained hierarchical flower-like TiO₂ nanostructures. Interestingly, the hierarchical structures are assembled by ultrathin nanosheets dominated by {001} facets, and the thickness of nanosheets are about 10 nm. We find that the reaction time plays an important role in the growth mechanism and the hierarchical flower-like of anatase TiO₂ was governed by a nucleation and nuclei growth-dissolution-recrystallization growth mechanism from time-dependent morphology evolution. The experimental parameters which influence the morphologies, such as reaction species and temperature, were further studied. The results show that the hierarchical flower-like nanostructures of anatase TiO₂ nanosheets dominated by {001} facets exhibit higher photocatalytic activity in the degradation of methylene blue under ultraviolet–visible light irradiation, can be attributed to the synergetic effect of the architecture, high crystallinity, large specific surface areas, and the exposed highly activity {001} facets of the photocatalysts. - Graphical abstract: The hierarchical flower-like nanostructures of anatase nanosheets were fabricated a one-pot, template-free method and employed ethanol as a mild solvent. The special structures were formed by adding reaction time and the as-prepared TiO₂ exhibited superior photocatalytic performances in degradation of methylene blue under UV–vis light irradiation. - Highlights: • The as-prepared TiO₂ was successfully synthesized by solvothermal method. • The formation mechanism of as-prepared TiO₂ were controlled by the reaction time. • Structural features of TiO₂ were characterized by means of different techniques. • The anatase TiO₂ exhibited superior photocatalytic performances.