Surface initiated graft polymerization from carbon-doped TiO2 nanoparticles under sunlight illumination

A simple and efficient method is presented for the preparation of polymer-grafted TiO2 by a photocatalytic polymerization. PMMA chains are directly grafted from the surface of the TiO2 nanoparticles in water under sunlight illumination. FT-IR and TEM results demonstrate that there existed strong chemical bonding at the interface of TiO2 nanoparticles and PMMA chains. The thermal stabilities of the grafted polymer are dramatically elevated relative to that of pure PMMA according to TGA results. Moreover, the resulted polymer exhibits much higher melting temperature compared with traditional stereoregular PMMA by controlling the conformation of polymer chains growing in the highly restricted space on the surface of nanoparticles.