Aerogel foams are a new class of materials that present combined architectures of polymer foams and polymer aerogels, such as abundant 10-100 µm size pores (as in foams) surrounded by polymer skin layers with inherent aerogel-type meso-(2-50 nm) and macropores (&gt;50 nm). Fabrication of such structures is challenging, as conventional foaming technologies are not compatible with aerogel synthesis methods. A large number of applications, however, can benefit from such materials, such as tissue scaffolds, oil recovery and oil-water separation, to name a few. The fabrication process developed in this work has been used as a tool for preparation of an array of aerogel foam structures from syndiotactic polystyrene (sPS), polyimide, and polyurea, with each material system offering unique challenges. Each system requires different processing methods stemming from variances in gelation chemistry and rate, phase separation mechanism, emulsion stability, and dispersed vs. continuous phase content. This work elucidates a simple method to develop one-component hierarchical porous polymer structures consisting of both micrometer-sized voids and nanometer-sized macropores in the form of aerogel foams. Using sPS as an illustrative example, this work investigated the formation mechanisms of various structural features such as void interconnects, skin layer at the void interfaces, as well as the macroporous matrix found in these emulsion-templated aerogel foams. This work was also successful in tuning the properties of these structural features for a variety of potential applications.

Emulsion templating as a tool for fabrication of open cell aerogel foams

254th National Meeting (2017)

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