Thermal behavior of Ni- and Cu-containing plasma electrolytic oxide coatings on titanium

. [Display omitted] ► Plasma electrolytic oxidation of titanium. ► NiO and CuO inclusions into PEO coatings result in CO oxidation above 200°C. ► Annealing leads to Cu content decrease and whiskers formation. ► Oxide surfaces coated by whiskers. In this work the effect of thermal annealing on the surface composition, structure and catalytic activity in CO oxidation of NiO+CuO/TiO2/Ti composites is studied. The composites have been obtained by a plasma electrolytic oxidation (PEO) technique, followed by impregnation in a solution of nickel (II) and copper (II) salts and air annealing. The structures contain ∼20at% Ni and ∼12at% Cu. It has been shown that the additional air annealing of such structures at temperature above 750°C results in phosphate crystallization in the coatings and decreasing of Cu concentration in the surface layers. A growth of filiform nanocrystals containing mainly oxygen compounds of nickel and titanium on the coating surface takes place at the temperatures above 700°C. The nanocrystals have a diameter of 50–200nm and lengths below 10μm. Such changes result in decreasing of catalytic activity of the composites in CO oxidation. At the same time the ascertained regularities may be of interest for obtaining the Ni-containing oxide catalysts with an extended surface, perspective for usage in organic catalysis or for preparing oxide nanofibers.