Aging and behavior of functional TiO₂ nanoparticles in aqueous environment

Author:

Huiting Lu  Haifeng Dong  Wenhong Fan  Jinxing Zuo  Xiaomin Li  

Journal:

Journal of Hazardous Materials

Issue Date:

2017

Abstract(summary):

Highlights • TiO 2 FNPs and its byproducts in various backgrounds were systematically investigated. • TiO 2 FNPs undergone a capping moieties-dependent transformation with aging processes. • The aging agents exhibited sharp change compared to fresh counterparts. • Environmental factors played a pivotal role in the behavior of the byproducts. Abstract Nanoparticles are usually functionalized with various surface capping moieties in practical applications. Understand the behavior and fate of them is critical to evaluate or even predict their risk to environment. However, little attention has been denoted on this issue until now. Using three commercial TiO 2 nanoparticles with different capping moieties, their aging procedures and corresponding change as well as their byproducts were systematically studied. Comprehensive microscopic and spectrometric measurements demonstrated a capping agent-dependent with the aging procedure. All the aging agents exhibited sharp change in morphologies compared to the fresh counterparts. The degraded degree and surface properties including surface charge and hydrophobicity of the functional TiO 2 nanoparticles were varied depended on the capping moieties. Furthermore, the behaviors of these byproducts in various background media had also been investigated. Contrastively, environment factors such as pH, electrolyte valence, and humic acid regardless of capping moieties govern the behavior of these byproducts, despite of the capping moieties slightly affect the point of zero charge. This study highlights the influence of the capping moieties and environmental factors to the transformation progress of functional nanomaterials in environment exposure, which contributes to design and assess the environmental risk of other analogous functional nanoparticles in practical application.

Page:

113-113