X-ray Photoelectron Spectroscopy Characterization of Two-Dimensional Titanium Metal Carbides (MXenes)

• Herein, we report X-ray Photoelectron Spectroscopy (XPS) analysis for cold pressed exfoliated 2D nanocrystals of transition metal carbides, MXenes. MXenes are a recently discovered family of 2D materials produced by selective chemical etching of the A element from MAX phases which are ternary metal carbides and nitrides. The latter has the formula of Mn+1AXn, where M is an early transition metal, A is an A-group element, and X is C and/or N. This study is a comparison between two MXenes, Ti3C2Tx and Ti2CTx, where Tx stands for surface termination groups such as –O, –OH, and –F. Ti3C2Tx and Ti2CTx were prepared by immersion of Ti3AlC2 and Ti2AlC powders in 50% conc. HF. A thorough XPS analysis was performed through peak fitting of high resolution XPS spectra and valence band, VB, spectra analysis. The effect of Ar sputtering as well as the number of layers n was the primarily interest of this study. According to the peak fitting analysis, both phases contain the following species, Ti–C, C–C, Ti–F, Ti–O and Ti–OH resulting in the following chemical formulas: Ti3C2(OH)x(O)y(F)z and Ti2C(OH)x(O)y(F)z. Comparing the VB spectra with the DOS calculations show the valance band spectra is actually a mixture of MXene with various terminations of OH, O and F. Before Ar+ sputtering both phases show a large percentage of fluorinated-TiO2 which is due to MXene surface oxidation as well as CHx, C-O and COO groups arising from either surface contaminations or due to drying the etched powders in ethanol after washing the powder of the HF acid. According to the VB spectra, it is shown that the fluorinated TiO2 is actually a mixture of anatase and rutile. The number of layers, n, also plays a role; the lower n, the more the MXene is prone to oxidation.

Ämnesord

NATURVETENSKAP  -- Kemi -- Fysikalisk kemi (hsv//swe)

NATURAL SCIENCES  -- Chemical Sciences -- Physical Chemistry (hsv//eng)

NATURVETENSKAP  -- Kemi (hsv//swe)

NATURAL SCIENCES  -- Chemical Sciences (hsv//eng)

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