Exfoliation of alpha- zirconium phosphate, Zr(HPO4)2.H2O (a-ZrP) is previously attained by treatment with tetra-n-butylammonium (TBA) hydroxide. While this is excellent for most applications, biological end uses of this 2D material require biofriendly alternative. Toward this goal, we developed a novel method to exfoliate alpha-ZrP using Bovine Serum Albumin (BSA) and a simple shear reactor, such as a kitchen blender. The exfoliation was rapid and essentially complete in few hours when a commercial shear reactor was used. The quality of the exfoliated nanoplates was followed by powder X-ray diffraction which indicated a rapid loss of the peak corresponding to the 7.6 Å peak and confirmed by electron microscopy. In addition to BSA, other proteins such as b-lactoglobulin, ovalbumin, lysozyme, glucose oxidase, and haemoglobin also induced exfoliation and the highest exfoliation efficiency has been achieved with ovalbumin (» 90% exfoliation efficiency at room temperature). The exfoliated alpha-ZrP nanoplates have been used as a biological matrix for building artificial light harvesting complexes which were very stable to photodegradation than without alpha-ZrP. This biofriendly material is being tested for applications such as drug delivery as well.

Kitchen Chemistry 102: Exfoliation of alpha-zirconium phosphate with proteins in a blender as an alternative to exfoliation by tetrabutyl ammonium hydroxide

256th National Meeting (2018)

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