X-ray analysis of nanoporous TiO2 synthesized by electrochemical anodization

This paper presents the study of the growth of nanoporous titanium dioxide (TiO2) via electrochemical anodization method. The effects of electrolyte with different ratios of ethanol to distilled water (i.e. from 1:9 to 5:5) on the morphological and structural properties were studied. X-ray diffraction (XRD) results revealed that crystalline structure (anatase) was obtained after being annealed at 600 °C for 30 min. Scherrer and Williamson-Hall methods were employed to calculate the crystallite size and lattice strain of the TiO2. It is found that similar trend was shared for both graphs of crystallite size versus ratio of ethanol to distilled water by both methods. The lattice strain is assumed to be compressive and it is inversely proportional with crystallite size. Results show that electrochemical anodization with ratio 3:7 ethanol to distilled water electrolyte produced lowest crystallite size and highest compressive strain.