Controllable growth of novel BiPO4 dendrites by an innovative approach and high energy facets-dependent photocatalytic activity

Abstract

For monoclinic BiPO₄, it seems fairly difficult to acquire the other novel nanostructures. Herein, we, for the first time, report the controllable syntheses of the six branch- and snowflake-like monoclinic BiPO₄ dendrites by ethylenediamine tetraacetic acid. It is surprising that the branch intersection fringes of dendrite have a twinning crystal structure. Moreover, the six branch dendrites show a higher photocatalytic activity than the other two samples, which has been mainly ascribed to its high-energy (002) facet exposed, high light absorbance, and BET area. This innovative branching growth strategy represents a major breakthrough with fairly few nanostructures (only nanoparticles, nanorods and octahedrons available) in the existing literature.