Photo-assisted Deposited Titanium Dioxide Film and the Enhancement of Its Photocatalytic Water Splitting Activity

Photo-assisted deposited method is often employed in the metal-organic chemical vapor deposition whose ion source is organic compounds. It has been proved to increase the deposition rate and improve the crystallinity of the films. We demonstrate a photo-assisted sputtering deposited method which is used to prepare high quality TiO2 films. The crystallinity of the films is improved by the photo assistance without changing the morphology. And the structural and optical properties remain the same. The photo-assisted deposited TiO2 film shows a H-2 evolution rate of 1.62 mu mol.cm(-2).h(-1) that is about twice more than that of the pristine TiO2 film. It is found the Mott-Schottky effect responds for the photocatalytic activity. Photo-assisted deposited films show an enhanced photocatalytic activity due to the reduction of interface recombination and the high efficiency in the transferring of photo-generated carriers.