Synthesis and characterization of Fe-doped TiO 2 photocatalyst by the sol–gel method

Thin layers of pure TiO 2 and TiO 2 doped by different amounts of Fe 2 O 3 have been prepared by the sol–gel method with tetraisopropyl orthotitanate and Fe(NO 3)3. Physico-chemical properties of catalysts were characterized by BET Adsorption, x-ray Diffraction (XRD), FE-SEM, as well as Raman and UV-Vis spectroscopy. The photocatalytic activity of the obtained materials was investigated in the reaction of complete oxidation of p-xylene in gas phase under the radiation of UV (λ=365 nm) and LED (λ=470 nm) lamps. It has been found that the particle size of all samples was distributed in the range 20–30 nm. The content of the rutile phase in Fe-doped TiO 2 samples varied in the range 6.8 to 41.8% depending on the Fe content. Iron oxide doped into TiO 2 enables the photon absorbing zone of TiO 2 to extend from UV towards visible waves as well as to reduce its band gap energy from 3.2 to 2.67 eV. Photocatalytic activities of the TiO 2 samples modified by Fe 3+ have been found to be higher than those of pure TiO 2 by about 2.5 times.