The preparation and characterization of the Ni-NiO/TiO2 hollow composite materials on micro-nano cellulose fibers

In this study, the Ni-NiO/TiO2 hollow composite materials were fabricated based on metallization cellulose fibers and TBOT (Tetrabutyl titanate) via Sol-Gel method. The XRD patterns and SEM morphology showed that the Ni and Ti particles had been deposited on the hollow structure, indicating that it was reasonable and feasible via method to prepare the Ni-NiO/TiO2 hollow composite materials. The FT-IR absorption band at 1035 cm−1 was characteristic of nano-TiO2 absorption peak. And 420 cm−1 may be attributed to the stretching vibration of the Ni-O absorption band. UV-Vis absorption spectra demonstrated an obvious red shift of the nickel-doped sample and the maximum shift of the threshold wavelength of the absorption spectrum of the samples was about 66 nm, and the minimum value of the band gap was 2.55 eV. The result showed that the maximum degradation rate of the sample calcined at 600 °C was up to 86.09%, which indicated that the Ni-NiO/TiO2 hollow composite materials can be applied as catalysts for photocatalytic degradation of heavy metals.