Hierarchically porous materials are of interest for catalysis, separations, sensing, and energy generation and storage. There are well developed methods based on templated sol-gel chemistry for forming large single pieces of such materials (monoliths) as silica and carbon. However, the challenges of sol-gel chemistry are such that extending this to other materials are significant. An alternative approach is to use hierarchically porous silica and carbon as hard templates for solution infiltration of precursors for other materials. An approach referred to as 'Nanocasting'. This approach has been widely applied for the synthesis of mesoporous metals, metal oxides and other ceramics such as silicon nitride and silicon carbide as powders. We have extended this approach to produce monolithic pieces of hierarchically porous metals and metal oxides by nanocasting into hierarchically porous silica. This presentation will address the fundamentals of this process and highlight applications of the approach.

Fundamentals of nanocasting to produce hierarchically porous materials

245th National Meeting (2013)

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