Synthesis of vanadium oxide/titanium dioxide nanocomposites via sonochemical and hydrothermal process and their utilisation for energy storage application

This work focuses on the synthesis of V 2 O 5 /TiO 2 nanocomposites by sonochemical and hydrothermal process. First, titanium dioxide (TiO 2 ) nanopowders were synthesised by sonochemical process using titanium isopropoxide as a titanium source. Meanwhile, hydrothermal process was employed to modify the structure of commercial V 2 O 5 powder to be nanorod-like structure V 2 O 5 to increase its specific surface area. Structural and morphological properties of the composites were characterised by X-ray diffraction, scanning electron microscope and transmission electron microscope. The XRD results indicate that the crystallisation of the composite corresponds to anatase and orthorhombic structures of TiO 2 and V 2 O 5 , respectively. The significant variation of charge storage properties of the composites under ultraviolet irradiation was obtained by varying V 2 O 5 content in the composite. Results suggest that V 2 O 5 loaded into the nanocomposite plays a key role as a storage material of photoelectrons generated by TiO 2 illuminated by ultraviolet irradiation.