Pore size engineering in mesoporous silicas using supercritical CO2

In this paper we investigate the use of supercritical carbon dioxide (sc-CO(2)) for synthesizing calcined mesoporous silicas with tunable pore sizes, wall thickness, and d spacings. Small angle neutron scattering was used to probe the controlled swelling of the triblock copolymer surfactant templating agents, P123 (PEO(20)PPO(69)PEO(20)), P85 (PEO(26)PPO(39)PEO(26)), and F127 (PEO(106)PPO(70)PEO(106)), as a function of CO(2) pressure. The transition from the liquid crystal phase to the calcined mesoporous silicas, formed upon condensation and drying, was also studied in detail. Powder X-ray diffraction, transmission electron microscopy, and nitrogen adsorption techniques were used to establish pore diameters, silica wall widths, and the hexagonal packing of the pores within the calcined silicas. Using a direct templating method, the diameters of mesopores and the spacing between the pores could be tuned with a high level of precision. The swelling process was observed to have no detrimental effects on the quality of silica formed, a distinct advantage over conventional swelling techniques, and all of the silicas synthesized in this study were highly ordered over distances of at least 2000 A.     

Vapor-phase synthesis of mesoporous SiO2-P2O5 thin films

Mesoporous SiO2-P2O5 films were synthesized from the vapor phase onto a silicon substrate. First, a precursor solution of cetyltrimethylammonium bromide (C16TAB), H3PO4, ethanol, and water was deposited on a silicon substrate by a spin-coating method. Then, the C16TAB-H3PO4 composite film was treated with tetraethoxysilane (TEOS) vapor at 90-180 degrees C for 2.5 h. The H3PO4-C16TAB composite formed a hexagonal structure on the silicon substrate before vapor treatment. The TEOS molecules penetrated into the film without a phase transition. The periodic mesostructure of the SiO2-P2O5 films was retained after calcination. The calcined films showed a high proton conductivity of about 0.55 S/cm at room temperature. The molar ratio of P/Si in the SiO2-P2O5 film was as high as 0.43, a level that was not attained by a premixing sol-gel method. The high phosphate group content and the ordered periodic mesostructure contributed to the high proton conductivity.     

介孔二氧化硅的扩孔及其氨基功能化

利用嵌段共聚物聚环氧乙烷-聚环氧丙烷-聚环氧乙烷(P123)作为胶束模板,均三甲苯(TMB)为扩孔剂,在强酸条件下制备出了一系列大孔径的介孔二氧化硅材料,获得了一种泡状新型结构的硅材料;通过N2吸附-脱附、高分辨透射电镜(HTEM)等手段对这种新型结构的材料进行了表征,综合考察了扩孔剂的用量、酸的浓度以及水热处理温度对...     

Pore spanning lipid bilayers on mesoporous silica having varying pore size

Synthetic lipid bilayers have similar properties as cell membranes and have been shown to be of great use in the development of novel biomimicry devices. In this study, lipid bilayer formation on mesoporous silica of varying pore size, 2, 4, and 6 nm, has been investigated using quartz crystal microbalance with dissipation monitoring (QCM-D), fluorescent recovery after photo bleaching (FRAP), and atomic force microscopy (AFM). The results show that pore-spanning lipid bilayers were successfully formed regardless of pore size. However, the mechanism of the bilayer formation was dependent on the pore size, and lower surface coverages of adsorbed lipid vesicles were required on the surface having the smallest pores. A similar trend was observed for the lateral diffusion coefficient (D) of fluorescently labeled lipid molecules in the membrane, which was lowest on the surface having the smallest pores and increased with the pore size. All of the pore size dependent observations are suggested to be due to the hydrophilicity of the surface, which decreases with increased pore size.     

Effects of template and precursor chemistry on structure and properties of mesoporous TiO2 thin films

Mesoporous TiO2 thin films were synthesized by sol-gel processing using an aqueous-based, inexpensive, and environmentally friendly precursor and cationic surfactants as templates under mild reaction conditions. The films were prepared by spin-coating on glass substrates followed by calcination to remove the surfactant. N2 sorption, X-ray diffraction, and transmission electron microscopy were used to characterize the porosity, pore size, and pore structure before and after calcination. Films were found to have wormlike pore structures after calcination and surface areas on the order of 200 m2/g. These results show that the mesostructure and porosity of the thin films can be controlled by the surfactant template chemistry such as surfactant/Ti ratio, pH, and rate of solvent evaporation.     

Deformation investigation on iPP/SiO2 composites: Influence of stretching temperature and particle size on morphology evolution and crystalline structure of thin films

 In the present work, structure changes during stretching of isotactic polypropylene (emPP) and emPP/silicon dioxide (SiO₂) composites have been investigated systematically. The α-form crystal structure of both iPP and emPP/SiO₂ composites is destroyed and transforms into the mesophase as the samples are stretched at a low temperature (35℃), while stretching at high temperatures (90℃ and 120℃) can restrain the appearance of defects and keep the perfection of crystal structure. FTIR results reveal that the stretching temperatures show no obvious difference of the effect on the orientation of pure iPP, however, the orientation of emPP/SiO₂ composites is greatly changed by the tensile temperature. In the case of micron-sized SiO₂ particles (average particle diameter d>1 μm), the orientation of the composites is lower than that of pure iPP at all stretching temperatures. The above results suggest that the stretching temperature and the SiO₂ particle size have great influence on the structure variation and orientation behavior of emPP/SiO₂ composites.     

孔结构对纳米浇注的中孔钙钛矿上甲醇氧化反应动力学的影响

限制工业有毒气体(如挥发性有机化合物)的排放是当今社会主要的挑战之一.因此,迫切需要开发出消除污染物、且不造成二次污染的环境友好技术.其中热燃烧技术比较有效,但通常该过程会采用贵金属催化剂以实现低温高活性.由于贵金属催化剂的成本较高,不利于工业应用,因此,人们一直致力于研究和开发新型材料以替代贵金属催化剂.研究发现,在许多部分氧化或完全氧化反应(特别是烃类或挥发性有机物的氧化反应)中,钙钛矿类复合金属氧化物(ABO3)具有与贵金属类似的催化性能.但是该材料的制各需在高温(＞ 700℃)条件下进行,使得其比表面积(＜30 m2/g)很低,因而限制了其应用.可见,欲使该材料在工业上得到广泛应用,必须在制备技术上实现很大的突破,即制得高比表面积的钙钛矿类材料.已有人通过在200℃下焙烧成功地制备了比表面积为1 00 m2/g的钙钛矿氧化物,但继续提高焙烧温度,所制样品的比表面积下降.在过去20年中,中孔氧化硅及随后众多中孔材料的成功制备,使得合成具有极高比表面积的非硅基材料(如碳,金属氧化物,和碳化物等)成为可能.在这些材料的制备方法中,纳米浇铸法因其特别适用于制备具有高比表面积的单金属或单金属氧化物而备受青睐.采用纳米浇铸法已经成功制得一系列材料,并用于很多催化反应中.但文献报道大多只局限于温度、催化剂组成或比表面积对其活性的影响.为了能将这些材料成功用于工业应用,需要对其表面反应机理和相关反应动力学进行深入的研究.最近,本课题组采用纳米浇铸法制备了高比表面积的中孔钙钛矿类氧化物,并考察了它们的催化性能.结果表明,在各种气相反应中,所制纳米浇注的钙钛矿类氧化物具有比相应体相氧化物更高的催化效率.基于此,本文以在不同温度老化的SBA-15为硬模板,采用纳米浇铸法制备高比表面积的LaMnO3材料,运用X-射线衍射、N2吸附-脱附、透射电镜、程序升温还原和O2-程序升温脱附等方法分析所制材料的晶相、织构、表面和氧化还原等性质,考察了其孔结构参数对其催化甲醇完全氧化反应性能和动力学的影响,以深入理解该类材料的催化性能.结果表明,以35,100,140℃老化制得的SBA-15为模板剂,成功地制得了La在A位,Mn在B位的一系列LaMnO3材料,它们具有可调控的比表面积(80-190 m2/g);同时,材料的比表面积与所用硬模板剂的老化温度存在很好的关联,且比表面积最大的样品具有最高的催化活性.测量了各催化剂在不同空速(19500-78200 h-1)条件下甲醇氧化反应结果,从而得到了各催化剂的速率常数,发现它们随着催化剂的比表面积而变化.再结合阿伦尼乌斯方程,采用线性回归法测得了所制备的三个催化剂上该方程的指前因子和表观活化能;发现在所考察的反应条件下,所有催化剂上反应的表观活化能较低,且保持不变.另外,指前因子与催化剂比表面积之间存在线性关系,表明尽管各催化剂的比表面积不同,但单位比表面积的甲醇氧化的比活性是相同的.由于在制备过程中很难除去残余的Si物种,因此未来工作中我们将进一步考察残余物种对纳米浇注的钙钛矿类材料性质的影响.     

Pore size effects in the pyrolysis of 1,3-diphenylpropane confined in mesoporous silicas

A new method for derivatizing mesoporous silicas, SBA-15 and MCM-41, with a substituted phenol is described, and pore confinement and surface curvature are shown to impact the reaction rate and product selectivity for the pyrolysis of surface-immobilized 1,3-diphenylpropane.     

Effect of TiO2 on the Pore Structure of SiO2-PDMS Ormosils

In this work, pore structure evolution of Ormosils containing TBT (Tetrabutyl titanate) has been characterized by means of mercury porosimetry, nitrogen adsorption and helium pycnometry. These ormosils have been prepared by the sol-gel method by the reaction of TEOS (tetraethoxysilane), PDMS (polydimethylsiloxane, silanol terminated) and TBT under acid-catalyzed conditions. The addition of TiO₂ increases the volume and specific surface of secondary micropores and at the same time decreases the corresponding volumes of mesopores and macropores. The presence of TiO₂ gives also a continuous decreasing in the pore connectivity being 9.7 for the ormosil without TiO₂ and 4.4 for that of the higher concentration of TiO₂. However, the pore length shows a significant decrease with the first addition of TiO₂ changing from 9.1 to 2.2 at the higher TiO₂ concentration. Pore volumes show a decrease as the TiO₂ concentration is increased in the ormosil. On the other hand, density increases and porosity decreases with the TiO₂ concentration. These results are in accordance with the presence of TiO₂ nanoparticles in the ormosil and the size of such nanoparticles increases with the TiO₂ concentration. Fractal constant has a low value, close to 2, for all different samples meaning that these ormosils can be considered as low surface roughness materials.     

纳米Ni/SiO2介孔复合体的制备与超顺磁性

采用溶胶—凝胶法制备了含Ni2+的SiO2干凝胶,再通过化学还原得到了纳米Ni/SiO2介孔复合体。从样品的透射电子显微镜观测结果可估算出,介孔复合体中Ni粒子的尺寸约为11～12 nm。样品的磁性测量结果表明,与通常的Ni纳米颗粒相比,纳米Ni/SiO2介孔复合体中纳米Ni粒子的粒径在大于理论计算的纳米Ni粒子的临界尺寸时,仍能够保持超顺磁状态。在一定温度范围内,提高还原温度有利于复合体中纳米Ni粒子向超顺磁状态转变。     

Fabrication of ordered mesoporous thin films for optical waveguiding and interferometric chemical sensing

Planar optical waveguides with a propagation loss of 2.9 dB/cm at 633 nm were fabricated using ordered mesoporous thin films of TiO2-P2O5 nanocomposite deposited on the tin-rich surfaces of float glass slides. The resulting waveguides show substantial sensitivity to parts-per-million-level ammonia gas at room temperature on the basis of single-beam polarimetric interferometry.     

Synthesis of SiO2 thin films by sol-gel method using photoirradiation and molecular structure analysis

The SiO₂ thin films were prepared by a process which combines a sol-gel method and photoirradiation. The HF etch rate and microhardness of a film prepared by this process were better than those of a film furnace-fired at same temperature. The Raman and ²⁹Si solid state NMR spectra of film prepared by this process were similar to those of a film furnace-fired at higher temperature. There are many unstable folded non-linear SiO₂ species in the film prepared at low temperature. On treatment at higher temperature, unstable folded non-linear Si-O-Si rearranges to the stable linear Si-O-Si bond. Photoirradiation enhances this structure change. The process provided denser and harder SiO₂ thin films, even at low temperature, than the conventional furnace-firing method did.     

Preparation of activated ordered mesoporous carbons with a channel structure

Activated ordered mesoporous carbons with a channel structure (AOMCs-CS) were successfully prepared by imposing CO(2) activation on ordered mesopore carbon C-FDU-15. It is found that the continuous carbon framework of the precursor C-FDU-15 plays an important role in keeping the order structure of the resulting AOMCs-CS. The mild activation (e.g., 31 wt % burnoff) does not impair the order degree. After that, the order degree gradually decreases with further increasing burnoff. However, the basic hexagonal mesostructure of C-FDU-15 can still be found in the AOMCs-CS when the burnoff is up to 73 wt %, although many carbon walls are punched and thus many larger mesopores and marcropores are generated. With increasing burnoff, the surface area and volume of micropores increase first and then decrease, and the surface area and volume of mesopores continuously increase. The highest measured Brunaruer-Emmett-Teller (BET) surface area, micropore volume, and total pore volume of the AOMCs-CS reach 2004 m(2)/g, 0.50 cm(3)/g, and 1.22 cm(3)/g, respectively.     

Pore size distribution analysis of selected hexagonal mesoporous silicas by grand canonical Monte Carlo simulations

We combine here a regularization procedure with individual adsorption isotherms obtained from grand canonical Monte Carlo simulations in order to obtain reliable pore size distributions. The methodology is applied to two hexagonal high-ordered silica materials: SBA-15 and PHTS, synthesized in our laboratory. Feasible pore size distributions are calculated through an adaptable procedure of deconvolution over the adsorption integral equation, with two necessary inputs: the experimental adsorption data and individual adsorption isotherms, assuming the validity of the independent pore model. The application of the deconvolution procedure implies an adequate grid size evaluation (i.e., numbers of pores and relative pressures to be considered for the inversion, or kernel size), the fulfillment of the discret Picard condition, and the appropriate choice of the regularization parameter (L-curve criteria). Assuming cylindrical geometry for both porous materials, the same set of individual adsorption isotherms generated from molecular simulations can be used to construct the kernel to obtain the PSD of SBA-15 and PHTS. The PSD robustness is measured imposing random errors over the experimental data. Excellent agreement is found between the calculated and the experimental global adsorption isotherms for both materials. Molecular simulations provide new insights into the studied systems, pointing out the need of high-resolution isotherms to describe the presence of complementary microporosity in these materials.     

Electrochemical determination of hesperidin using mesoporous SiO2 modified electrode

A simple micro-capillary electrophoresis system to be used as disposable device was developed. A short commercial capillary was used as the separation channel, hydrostatic pressure generated by the sample employed for injection, and a voltage of 200 V used for separation in a 6 cm long capillary assisted by hydrostatic pressure of the carrier. The device was used for the separation of dopamine and catechol. Good reproducibility and efficiency was obtained. Because the instrumentation and operation conditions were simplified, and a replaceable modular separation channel was used, the proposed micro-capillary electrophoresis system is potentially useful in disposable devices.     

Effects of trace metals and organic additives on porosity and dielectric constant of high purity mesoporous silica films

The beneficial effects that alkali metal and alkylammonium salt additions to molecularly templated silica sols have on the resulting mesoporous silica films formed from evaporative-coating methods with respect to porosity, elastic modulus, dielectric constant, and film surface uniformity were investigated and identified.     

Non‐surfactant template‐directed synthesis of SiO2‐polyimide hybrid self‐standing films with ordered mesoporous structure

The silica‐PI hybrid self‐standing films with ordered mesoporous structure have been prepared by using dibenzoyl‐L ‐tartaric acid (L ‐DBTA) as non‐surfactant template under mild sol–gel route. Polyimide matrix was obtained from polyamic acid (PAA) via thermal imidization process and the template was removed in this process. The PI‐based hybrid film with 20 wt% SiO₂ obtained from DBTA presented the ordered mesoporous channels with average pore size of about 2.0 nm and BET surface area of 1167 m²/g. FTIR and SEM studies indicated that the hydrogen bond interaction between the carboxylic groups of DBTA and benzamide bonds of PAA made the PAA possibly participate in the assembly process of the aggregates of the non‐surfactant template molecules. The mechanical, thermal and some physical properties of these hybrid films materials were also characterized. Copyright © 2010 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

有序中孔纳米多晶TiO~2薄膜的Li^+嵌脱行为

以三嵌段高分子非离子表面活性剂为结构导向剂,在非水条件下,合成了具有均一孔径分布(6.5nm)、高比表面积的稳定的中孔纳米多晶TiO~2薄膜。用循环伏安与电位阶跃技术研究了薄膜的Li^+离子嵌入反应。结果表明,由非离子表面活性剂导向而成的中孔TiO~2薄膜具有较大的Li^+离子嵌入容量,伏安特性中双电层电容效应非常显著,Li^+离子在脱嵌过程中电荷传递系数在0.15～0.4之间,嵌入系数为(4.7～55)×10^-^1^2cm^2/s。这些结果显示了具有大的比表面中孔TiO~2薄膜具有不同一般Li^+离子嵌入TiO~2薄膜的电化学反应特征。     

Thermal effect on microstructure vibration of SiO2 thin films

The microstructure of amorphous SiO₂ thin film is a random network structure in which a large amount of [SiO₄] is interconnected with a specific SiOSi bond angle. The SiO₂ thin films used in this paper were prepared by ion beam sputtering and electron beam evaporation deposition techniques. Two-dimensional correlation spectroscopy analysis techniques were used in this study. By measuring the infrared temperature spectrum, we obtained the two-dimensional correlation synchronous spectrum and asynchronous spectrum, and decomposed the in-phase and out-phase asymmetric stretching vibration characteristics of SiOSi. As the temperature increases, the spectral transmittance of the vibrating peak decreases, and the relative change of in-phase asymmetric stretching vibration absorption peak is higher than that of the out-phase asymmetric stretching vibration absorption peak.