Rutile TiO2(011)-2 × 1 Reconstructed Surfaces with Optical Absorption over the Visible Light Spectrum

Rulong Zhou; Dongdong Li; Bingyan Qu; Xiaorui Sun; Bo Zhang; Xiao Cheng Zeng

doi:10.1021/acsami.6b10718

Rutile TiO₂(011)-2 × 1 Reconstructed Surfaces with Optical Absorption over the Visible Light Spectrum

ACS Appl Mater Interfaces. 2016 Oct 12;8(40):27403-27410. doi: 10.1021/acsami.6b10718. Epub 2016 Sep 30.

Authors

Rulong Zhou¹, Dongdong Li¹, Bingyan Qu¹, Xiaorui Sun¹, Bo Zhang¹, Xiao Cheng Zeng^{2

3}

Affiliations

¹ Laboratory of Amorphous Materials, School of Materials Science and Engineering, Hefei University of Technology , Hefei, Anhui 230009, China.
² Department of Chemistry and Nebraska Center for Materials and Nanoscience, University of Nebraska-Lincoln , Lincoln, Nebraska 68588, United States.
³ Hefei National Laboratory for Physical Sciences at Microscale and Collaborative Innovation Center of Chemistry for Energy Materials, University of Science and Technology of China , Hefei, Anhui 230026, China.

PMID: 27653160
DOI: 10.1021/acsami.6b10718

Abstract

The stable structures of the reconstructed rutile TiO₂(011) surface are explored based on an evolutionary method. In addition to the well-known "brookite(001)-like" 2 × 1 reconstruction model, three 2 × 1 reconstruction structures are revealed for the first time, all being more stable in the high Ti-rich condition. Importantly, the predicted Ti₄O₄-2 × 1 surface model not only is in excellent agreement with the reconstructed metastable surface detected by Tao et al. [Nat. Chem. 3, 296 (2011)] from their STM experiment but also gives a consistent formation mechanism and electronic structures with the measured surface. The computed imaginary part of the dielectric function suggests that the newly predicted reconstructed surfaces are capable of optical absorption over the entire visible light spectrum, thereby offering high potential for photocatalytic applications.

Keywords: Rutile TiO2; electronic structure; first-principles calculation; photocatalysis; surface reconstruction.