Structure of water in mesoporous organosilica by calorimetry and inelastic neutron scattering

In this paper, we describe the preparation of mesoporous organosilica samples with hydrophilic or hydrophobic organic functionality inside the silica channel. We synthesized mesoporous organosilica of identical pore sizes based on two different organic surface functionality namely hydrophobic (based on octyltriethoxysilane OTES) and hydrophilic (3-aminopropyltriethoxysilane ATES) and MCM-41 was used as a reference system. The structure of water/ice in those porous silica samples have been investigated over a range temperatures by differential scanning calorimetry (DSC) and inelastic neutron scattering (INS). INS study revealed that water confined in hydrophobic mesoporous organosilica shows vibrational behavior strongly different than bulk water. It consists of two states: water with strong and weak hydrogen bonds (with ratio 1:2.65, respectively), compared to ice-Ih. The corresponding O-O distances in these water states are 2.67 and 2.87 ?, which strongly differ compared to ice-Ih (2.76 ?). INS spectra for water in hydrophilic mesoporous organosilica ATES show behavior similar to bulk water, but with greater degree of disorder.     

Properties of Water Confined in Periodic Mesoporous Organosilicas: Nanoimprinting the Local Structure

The properties of materials confined in porous media are important in scientific and technological aspects. Topology, size, and surface polarity of the pores play a critical role in the confinement effects, however, knowledge regarding the guest–pore interface structure is still lacking. Herein, we show that the molecular mobility of water confined in periodic mesoporous organosilicas (PMOs) is influenced by the polarity of the organic moiety. Multidimensional solid‐state NMR spectroscopy directly probes the spatial arrangement of water inside the pores, showing that water interacts either with only the silicate layer or with both silicate and organic layers depending on the alternating surface polarity. A modulated and a uniform pore filling mode are proposed for different types of PMOs.     

Periodic mesoporous organosilica with ionic liquid framework as a novel fiber coating for headspace solid-phase microextraction of polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons

Periodic mesoporous organosilica based on alkylimidazolium ionic liquid (PMO-IL) was prepared and used as a highly porous fiber coating material for solid-phase microextraction (SPME). The prepared nanomaterial was immobilized onto a stainless steel wire for fabrication of the SPME fiber. The fiber was evaluated for the extraction of some polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons (PAHs) from aqueous sample solutions in combination with gas chromatography–mass spectrometry (GC–MS). A one at-the-time optimization strategy was applied for optimizing the important extraction parameters such as extraction temperature, extraction time, ionic strength, stirring rate, and desorption temperature and time. In optimum conditions, the repeatability for one fiber (n = 3), expressed as relative standard deviation (R.S.D.%), was between 4.3% and 9.7% for the test compounds. The detection limits for the studied compounds were between 4 and 9 pg mL⁻¹. The developed method offers the advantage of being simple to use, with shorter analysis time, lower cost of equipment, thermal stability of fiber and high relative recovery in comparison to conventional methods of analysis.     

A Zinc Phthalocyanine Based Periodic Mesoporous Organosilica Exhibiting Charge Transfer to Fullerenes

Periodic mesoporous organosilica (PMO) materials offer a strategy to position molecular semiconductors within a highly defined, porous network. We developed thin films of a new semiconducting zinc phthalocyanine‐bridged PMO exhibiting a face‐centered orthorhombic pore structure with an average pore diameter of 11 nm. The exceptional degree of order achieved with this PMO enabled us to create thin films consisting of a single porous domain throughout their entire thickness, thus providing maximal accessibility for subsequent incorporation of a complementary phase. The phthalocyanine building blocks inside the pore walls were found to be well‐aggregated, enabling electronic conductivity and extending the light‐harvesting capabilities to the near IR region. Ordered 3D heterojunctions capable of promoting photo‐induced charge transfer were constructed by impregnation of the PMO with a fullerene derivative. When integrated into a photovoltaic device, the infiltrated PMO is capable of producing a high open‐circuit voltage and a considerable photocurrent, which represents a significant step towards potential applications of PMOs in optoelectronics.     

Selective oxidation of alcohols with hydrogen peroxide catalyzed by tungstate ions (WO4) supported on periodic mesoporous organosilica with imidazolium frameworks (PMO-IL)

Tungstate ions supported on the periodic mesoporous organosilica with ionic liquid frameworks (WO₄⁼@PMO-IL) were found to be a recoverable catalyst system for the highly selective oxidation of various primary or secondary alcohols to the corresponding aldehydes or ketones by 30% H₂O₂ as green oxidant under neutral aqueous reaction conditions. The catalyst can be also recovered and efficiently reused in seven subsequent reaction cycles without any remarkable decreasing in the catalyst activity and selectivity. Moreover, N₂ sorption analysis, transmission electron microscopy (TEM) images, and thermal gravimetric analysis (TGA) showed that the structure regularity and functional groups loaded of the catalyst were not affected during the reaction process.     

A Periodic Mesoporous Organosilica‐Based Donor–Acceptor System for Photocatalytic Hydrogen Evolution

A new solid‐sate donor–acceptor system based on periodic mesoporous organosilica (PMO) has been constructed. Viologen (Vio) was covalently attached to the framework of a biphenyl (Bp)‐bridged PMO. The diffuse reflectance spectrum showed the formation of charge‐transfer (CT) complexes of Bp in the framework with Vio in the mesochannels. The transient absorption spectra upon excitation of the CT complexes displayed two absorption bands due to radical cations of Bp and Vio species, which indicated electron transfer from Bp to Vio. The absorption bands slowly decayed with a half‐decay period of approximately 10 μs but maintained the spectral shape, thereby suggesting persistent charge separation followed by recombination. To utilize the charge separation for photocatalysis, Vio–Bp–PMO was loaded with platinum and its photocatalytic performance was tested. The catalyst successfully evolved hydrogen with excitation of the CT complexes in the presence of a sacrificial agent. In contrast, reference catalysts without either Bp–PMO or Vio gave no or little hydrogen generation, respectively. In addition, a homogeneous solution system of Bp molecules, methylviologen, and colloidal platinum also evolved no hydrogen, possibly due to a weaker electron‐donating feature of molecular Bp than that of densely packed Bp in Bp–PMO. These results indicated that densely packed Bp and Vio are essential for hydrogen evolution in this system and demonstrated the potential of PMO as the basis for donor–acceptor systems suitable for photocatalysis.     

Thermal Stability of Silica-polyorganosiloxane Systems

Thermal stability of silica-polyvinylsiloxane systems with different ratio of hydrophilic and hydrophobic components and its forms with adsorbed dyes were studied using thermochemical method. It was shown that the maximum of endoeffect relating to dehydroxylation of sorbents surface is observed at 325°C. The maximum temperature of the second endoeffect depends on the organosilica sorbents composition and increases with a decrease of hydrophilic and hydrophobic sites ratio. It was found that the values of the summary thermal effect lowers upon the raise of the quantity of silanol groups. It was shown that thermal stability of composition materials is higher in comparison with initial organosilica sorbents. This revised version was published online in August 2006 with corrections to the Cover Date.     

One‐pot synthesis of organic–inorganic hybrid polyhedral oligomeric silsesquioxane microparticles in a double‐zone temperature controlled microfluidic reactor

Polyhedral oligomeric silsesquioxane (POSS) particles are one of the smallest organosilica nano‐cage structures with high multifunctionality that show both organic and inorganic properties. Until now poly(POSS) structures have been synthesized from beginning with a methacryl‐POSS monomer in free‐radical mechanism with batch‐wise methods that use sacrificial templates or additional multisteps. This study introduces a novel one‐pot synthesis inside a continuous flow, double temperature zone microfluidic reactor where the methodology is based on dispersion polymerization. As a result, spherical monodisperse POSS microparticles were obtained and characterized to determine their morphology, surface chemical structure, and thermal behavior by SEM, FTIR, and TGA, respectively. These results were also compared and reported with the outcomes of batch‐wise synthesis. © 2019 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. J. Polym. Sci., Part A: Polym. Chem. 2019, 57, 1396–1403     

An efficient and new protocol for the Heck reaction using palladium nanoparticle‐engineered dibenzo‐18‐crown‐6‐ether/MCM‐41 nanocomposite in water

Palladium nanoparticle‐incorporated mesoporous organosilica (MCM‐41‐Crown.Pd) was synthesized via the grafting of dibenzo‐18‐crown‐6‐ether moieties on the MCM‐41 surface, followed by reaction of the nanocomposite with palladium acetate and then its reduction in ethanol. The cavity of the immobilized dibenzo‐18‐crown‐6 as host material can stabilize the palladium nanoparticles effectively and prevent their aggregation and separation from the surface. The structure of the nanocomposite was characterized using various techniques. The catalytic properties of the nanocomposite in the Heck coupling reaction, one of the most useful transformations in organic synthesis, between aryl halides and olefins in water were also explored. The main advantages of the method are low cost, high yields, easy work‐up and short reaction time. The nanocatalyst can be easily separated from a reaction mixture and was successfully examined for seven runs, with a slight loss of catalytic activity.     

Synthesis and characterization of periodic mesoporous organosilicas from bridged organosilanes in the presence of mixed salts

A simple but effective synthetic pathway to periodic mesoporous organosilicas (PMOs) has been put forward in this article. The novelty of the present preparative route lies in that, for specific examples, highly ordered ethane- and benzenesilica PMOs can be facilely prepared in the presence of an inorganic salt pair within a wide compositional range, where no addition of mineral acids was necessary. Most of interest is that crystal-like pore walls were observed for the large-pore benzenesilica PMO promoted by this novel system, which has rarely been reported for copolymer-assembled organosilicas, even though the degree of molecular order is not as perfect as those benzenesilicas prepared under basic conditions utilizing cationic surfactants as template. Characterization results based on a series of techniques indicated that both inorganic salts are important for the assembly of ordered mesostructures under the present system, and a plausible formation mechanism deduced from the “salt-assisted” concept as previously reported for mesoporous nonsiliceous materials was discussed.