Synthesis, Characterization And Properties Of Photocatalytic Materials Templated By Butterfly Wing Scales

After billion years of evolution, nature creatures have adaptedthemselves to their living environment with elaborate structures. Thecombination of the fine hierarchical structures and the components results inthe integration of the structure and function. For example, Some researchwork has proved that scales of Papilionoidea wings are some excitingquasi-honeycomb microstructures and the special structure could absorb lightwithout reflectance like the property of something like black body. Inspiredby the integration of structure and function of the biological species, weemploy nature structures to fabricate functional materials, was given and is ofgreat interest.In the present work, butterfly wings were used to synthesize biomorphicTiO2/Fe2O3and biomorphic Bi2WO6with structures inherited from butterflywings by controlling the synthesize process. A series of methods are used forthe study and characterization of the originai butterfly wings and the replica.The work can be divided into three parts as follows:1. The wings of Papilio paris was selected as original templates andoptical microscope and field emission scanning electron microscope(FE-SEM) are used to observe the typical scales arrangement andmorphology.2. Biomorphic TiO2doped Fe2O3(TiO2/Fe2O3) was fabricate by usingas the template, the influence of the TiO2doping amount on the materials wasstudied, including crystal type, morphology, specific surface area, andphotocatalytic hydrogen production from water was measured and the optimal doping amount was determined throughexperiments under visiblelight.3. Biomorphic Bi2WO6was fabricate. The influence of the concentrationof the precursor on the final product was investigated, including morphology,and phase crystal. By using XRD, FESEM, TEM measurements, wecharacterized the crystal, morphologies, and detailed nanostructures’information of the obtained metal oxide. When used as photocatalyst forwater splitting, the amount of evolved O2from Biomorphic Bi2WO6is muchhigher than that of pure powder. The improved performance is due to thespecial hierarchical porous morphology.