Abstract: Visible-light responsive TiO2 catalysts were prepared by a one-pot method at low temperature in different amine systems using TiCl3 as the precursor. The as-synthesized powders were characterized by X-ray diffraction, ultraviolet-visible absorption spectroscopy, elemental analysis, Fourier transform infrared spectroscopy, and X-ray photoelectron spectroscopy. The results showed that the absorption regions of the as-synthesized powders red shifted to the visible region, and the ethylenediamine system was obviously prior to the triethylamine and diethylamine systems. The nitrogen atom was located at the oxygen site of TiO2 lattice to form O[KG-45x]-[KG-20x]Ti[KG-45x]-[KG-20x]N structure in the ethylenediamine synthetic system. Phenol degradation was used as a probe reaction to evaluate the photocatalytic activity of nitrogen-doped TiO2 and 97.88% phenol was degraded after 6 h under visible light irradiation.

Key words: titanium dioxide, visible light, amine, nitrogen doping, phenol, degradation