Authors: Jedidi, W; Arfaoui, J; Caudillo-Flores, U; Munoz-Batista, MJ; Ksibi, Z; Kubacka, A; Ghorbel, A; Fernandez-Garcia, M

Article.
Mater. Sci. Eng. B-Adv. Funct. Solid-State Mater.. vol: 286. page: 0921-5107.
Date: DEC. 2022.
Doi: 10.1016/j.mseb.2022.116034.

Abstract:
For improving the photocatalytic activity of titania under UV or sunlight (SL) irradiations in the gaseous phase degradation of 2-propanol, M-TiO2 catalysts were synthesized by the sol-gel method (with M = Zr, Zn and Nb) and characterized by various techniques. It was found that the solids show only the diffraction peaks of TiO2 anatase phase with high surface area and porosity. The type of transition metal affects the physicochemical properties and photocatalytic activity of M-TiO2 catalysts which were found more active and more selective to CO2 using UV illumination. Only the Nb-TiO2 solid was less active than TiO2. However, 0.5 % Zr-TiO2 sample was the most efficient catalyst for the photodegradation of 2-propanol with 58 % as 2-propanol maximum conversion to CO2 (54.4 %) and acetone (45.6 %) under UV. This is attributed to its high surface area and porosity, reduced particle size and low band gap energy..