Photocatalytic Surface-Initiated Polymerization on TiO2 toward Well-Defined Composite Nanostructures

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• 作者：Xin Wang ; Qipeng Lu ; Xuefei Wang ; Jibong Joo ; Michael Dahl ; Bo Liu ; Chuanbo Gao ; Yadong Yin
• 刊名：ACS Applied Materials & Interfaces
• 出版年：2016
• 出版时间：January 13, 2016
• 年：2016
• 卷：8
• 期：1
• 页码：538-546
• 全文大小：584K
• ISSN：1944-8252

文摘

We demonstrate the use of TiO₂ nanospheres as the photoinitiator for photocatalytic surface-initiated polymerization for the synthesis of various inorganic/polymer nanocomposites with well-defined structures. The excitation of TiO₂ by UV-light irradiation produces electrons and holes which drive the free radical polymerization near its surface, producing core/shell composite nanospheres with eccentric or concentric structures that can be tuned by controlling the surface compatibility between the polymer and the TiO₂. When highly porous TiO₂ nanospheres were employed as the photoinitiator, polymerization could disintegrate the mesoporous framework and give rise to nanocomposites with multiple TiO₂ nanoparticles evenly distributed in the polymer spheres. Thanks to the well-developed sol–gel chemistry of titania, this synthesis is well-extendable to the coating of the polymers on many other substrates of interest such as silica and ZnS by simply premodifying their surface with a thin layer of titania. In addition, this strategy could be easily applied to coating of different types of polymers such as polystyrene, poly(methyl methacrylate), and poly(N-isopropylacrylamide). We expect this photocatalytic surface-initiated polymerization process could provide a platform for the synthesis of various inorganic/polymer hybrid nanocomposites for many interesting applications.