In-situ growth of N–TiO2 on delaminated N–Ti3C2 with highly strengthened photocatalytic activity

Herein, a collection of N–TiO2/delaminated N–Ti3C2 (NTTx) composites is designed and synthesized by one-step calcination of NH4Cl–Ti3C2 precursors. The thermal decomposition of NH4Cl not only serves as the gas template to make the delamination of Ti3C2, but also acts as N source to for doping. As expected, the N–TiO2 nanoparticles uniformly anchor on the surface and interlayer of Ti3C2 nanosheets with intimate contact. Both the photocatalytic degradation rate of Rh–B and photocatalytic nitrogen fixation experiments of NTT2 composites show higher performance than that of pure P25 and NTT0 under visible light irradiation. The strengthened photocatalytic activity is due to the decrease of band gap by N doping in TiO2 and excellent electrical conductivity of N–Ti3C2, which leads to enhanced light response and photogenerated electron-hole separation, respectively. This study develops a new strategy to design efficient photocatalysts for degradation of contaminants and fixation of nitrogen.