Highly branched RuO2 Nanorods on Electrospun TiO2 Nanofibers toward Electrochemical Catalysts

We report a facile growth route to synthesize hierarchically grown single crystalline metallic RuO$_{2}$ nanorods on electrospun TiO$_{2}$ nanofibers via a combination of a simple vapour phase transport process with an electrospinning process. This synthetic strategy could be very useful to design a variety of highly branched network architectures of the functional hetero-nanostructures for electrochemical applications. Particularly, Ruthenium oxide (RuO$_{2})$ 1-dimensional nanostructures can be used as the effective catalysts or electrochemical electrode materials. Thus, we first synthesize TiO$_{2}$ nanofibers from mixture of titanium isopropoxide precursor and polymer and then ruthenium hydroxide precursor on TiO$_{2}$ nanofibers are transformed into RuO2 nanorods by thermal treatment at 250$^{o}$C in air. The crystalline structures of products are confirmed using scanning electron microscopy (FE-SEM), X-ray diffraction (XRD) spectrum, Raman spectroscopy, and high resolution electron microscopy (HRTEM). The fundamental electrochemical performances are examined using cyclic voltammetry (CV).