Abstract
A novel facile and cost‐effective synthesis method for anatase TiO2 nanoparticles has been developed by using poly‐acrylic acid hydrogel as template at room temperature. The newly developed synthesis method avoids the use of hazardous reagents and/or hydrothermal steps, and enables production of highly active TiO2 nanoparticles from low cost inorganic titanium sources. The synthesized TiO2 nanoparticles have been studied in several applications including dye‐sensitized solar cells as a photoanode as well as in organics degradation of methyl orange in aqueous media. Good photocatalytic performances were obtained in both applications.
A low‐cost, eco‐friendly and simple preparation method which allows the utilisation either organic or less expensive inorganic sources to obtain anatase TiO2 nanoparticles is reported in this work. The as‐prepared nanoparticles showed promising results in DSSCs as well as in dye degradation.