Chiral and Luminescent TiO2 Nanoparticles

Abstract

In this work, new chiral and luminescent TiO2 nanomaterials are prepared by a single step nonaqueous synthesis. Using circular dichroism spectroscopy it is shown that TiO2 nanoparticles are optically active with almost identical mirror images of one another in the band-edge region of titanium dioxide. Investigations of the photoluminescence properties reveal a broad shallow trap state emission centered at 440 nm, with a photoluminescence quantum yield of ≈3.5%, which is among the highest reported for TiO2. Electron microscopy reveals the TiO2 nanostructures to be dendritic aggregates measuring 30–50 nm in size composed of smaller nanorods of 3–4 nm in diameter.