Mechanism of Anodic Growth of Tubular Titania

Abstract

The anodic growth conditions of titania with a tubular structure are investigated. We propose a mechanism of anodic growth of tubular titania, which presupposes that electrochemical oxidation of titanium is predominantly confined to the bottom of pores in a barrier layer, i.e., where the anodic current density is higher, which causes a temperature rise in these regions. As the barrier layer temperature exceeds a certain threshold, the structure of growing oxide changes from the commonly obtained porous honeycomb-like structure to a tubular one. The proposed mechanism is supported by experimental results.