Synthesis, Characterization, Directional Crystal Growth Mechanism and Photocatalytic Activity of Three-Dimensional Hierarchical Fern-Like Nanostructures of BaTiO3

BaTiO3 with fern-like nano-structural morphology has been successfully synthesized via a simple sol-gel method followed by ageing process and was characterized by X-ray powder diffraction (PXRD) and Raman spectroscopy. The composition and the morphology was confirmed by scanning electron microscopy (SEM) with Energy dispersive X-ray spectroscopy and (high-resolution) transmission electron microscopy (TEM/HRTEM). The bonding linkage between Ba, Ti and O in the BaTiO3 sample was obtained by FTIR study. The band gap was calculated by using Kubelka-Munk function based on UV-absorption spectroscopic studies. The binding state of the elements present in BaTiO3 were obtained from XPS analysis. The details pertaining to thermal decomposition process of the uncalcined barium titanyl oxalate to barium titanate was obtained from TGA analysis. The surface area was determined by BET adsorption-desorption isotherms. The plausible directional growth mechanism of different BaTiO3 facets forming fern-like clusters is discussed in detail. The fern-like BaTiO3 exhibited only Ì´ 10% higher photocatalytic activity compared to the BaTiO3 with coral-like morphology for the degradation of methyl orange (MO) dye under UV irradiation.The photocatalytic degradation was also explored by the addition of H2O2 as electron scavenger, KI as surface hydroxyl radical scavenger and TBA as bulk hydroxyl radical scavenger.