Fabrication and Utilization of Titania Nanofibers from Natural Leucoxene Mineral in Photovoltaic Applications

Abstract

TiO[subscript 2] nanofibers were synthesized from natural leucoxene mineral via a hydrothermal process. The shapes, crystalline structure, shape transformation, phase transformation, and specific surface area of the resulting nanostructured materials were characterized by X-ray diffraction (XRD), scanning electron microscopy (SEM). transmission electron microscopy (TEM], and Brunauer-Emmett-Teller (BET] surface area measurements. The size of prepared nanofibers was about 12-58 nm in width and about 3-22 (mu)m in length. The BET surface area of the prepared sample was about 55m[superscript 2/g. Obtained nanofibers were preliminarily applied as photo catalysis for hydrogen evolution and electrodes for dye sensitized solar cells (DSSCs).