Study of the structure and lattice distortion on the sensing properties of hierarchical rutile TiO2 nanoarchitectures

Abstract

In this paper, we report the hydrothermal synthesis of 3D hierarchical rutile TiO2 nanorod microspheres in an acid medium with controlled morphology. Four different controlled hierarchical rutile TiO2 architectures (HRTA) characterized by X-ray diffraction (XRD), Rietveld refinement, scanning electron microscopy (SEM) were tested as an electrochemical sensor to quantify nitrobenzene (NB) in aqueous solution. Based on the characterization results, we found the open hierarchical nanorod microspheres with flower-like appearance showing a higher distortion of the octahedral structure and higher performance as an electrochemical sensor reaching NB concentrations below the parts per billion. The findings of this study have several valuable implications for future studies of volatile organic compound (COV) monitoring in aqueous solution using flower-like hierarchical rutile TiO2 nanorod microspheres clusters.