Mesoporous controlled polymerizations

Since the 1990s, mesoporous materials have attracted a great deal of attention based on their apphcations in the fields of molecular sorption, ahgnment, confinement, and the formation of nanoclusters. Unlike microporous zeohtes, these materials are usuaUy prepared via template methods, and have ordered hexagonal or cubic charmels with pore diameters ranging from 2 to 10 nm. The internal surface of the mesoporous materials can be modified by covalently anchoring a number of functional groups to their channel walls. Thus, mesoporous materials are also attractive in view not only of controlled polymerization but also the formation of polymer nanocomposites [10]. 

Porous polymer materials, especially in particulate form, are of interest in a diverse range of applications, including controlled drug delivery, enzyme immobilization, molecular separation technology, and as hosts for chemical synthesis [101-104]. MS materials have been used as hosts for the template synthesis of nanoporous polymer replicas through in situ polymerization of monomers in the mesopores [105-108]. 

Control over the material s shape at the nanoscale enables further control over reactants access to the dopant, and ultimately affords a potent means of controlling function which is analogous to that parsimoniously employed by Nature to synthesize materials with myriad function with a surprisingly low number of material s building blocks. A nice illustration is offered by the extrusion catalytic polymerization of ethylene within the hexagonal channels of MCM-41 mesoporous silica doped with catalyst titanocene.36 The structure is made of amorphous silica walls spatially arranged into periodic arrays with high surface area (up to 1400 m2g 1) and mesopore volume >0.7 mLg-1. In this case, restricted conformation dictates polymerization the pore diameter... 

It is our intention to present strategies based on chemically induced phase separation (CIPS), which allow one to prepare porous thermosets with controlled size and distribution in the low pm-range. According to lUPAC nomenclature, porous materials with pore sizes greater than 50 nm should be termed macroporous [1]. Based on this terminology, porous materials with pore diameters lower than 2 nm are called microporous. The nomination mesoporous is reserved for materials with intermediate pore sizes. In this introductory section, we will classify and explain the different approaches to prepare porous polymers and to check their feasibility to achieve macroporous thermosets. A summary of the technologically most important techniques to prepare polymeric foams can be found in [2,3]. 

The use of a polymer species as a way to control diffusion to the inside of mesoporous silica was also employed by Lopez and coworkers.67 In this work the researchers polymerized iV-isopropyl acrylamide on mesoporous silica by atom transfer radical polymerization, and took advantage of the changes the polymer experiences upon thermal treatment. The authors discovered that the hybrid material could take up more fluorescein than nonfunctionalized material at temperatures above 45°C. At that temperature the polymer is in a collapsed hydrophobic state and partially covers the negatively charged surface of silica that otherwise repels the negatively charged fluorescein dye. At temperatures below 30°C the polymer exists in a hydrated state in which the chains are expanded. Interestingly, the fluorescein loaded hybrid particles were... 

Non-aqueous synthetic methods have recently been used to assemble mesoporous transition metal oxides and sulfides. This approach may afford greater control over the condensation-polymerization chemistry of precursor species and lead to enhanced surface area materials and well ordered structures [38, 39], For the first time, a rational synthesis of mesostructured metal germanium sulfides from the co-assembly of adamantanoid [Ge4S ()]4 cluster precursors was reported [38], Formamide was used as a solvent to co-assemble surfactant and adamantanoid clusters, while M2+/1+ transition metal ions were used to link the clusters (see Fig. 2.2). This produced exceptionally well-ordered mesostructured metal germanium sulfide materials, which could find application in detoxification of heavy metals, sensing of sulfurous vapors and the formation of semiconductor quantum anti-dot devices. 

In the acidic route (with pH < 2), both kinetic and thermodynamic controlling factors need to be considered. First, the acid catalysis speeds up the hydrolysis of silicon alkoxides. Second, the silica species in solution are positively charged as =SiOH2 (denoted as I+). Finally, the siloxane bond condensation rate is kinetically promoted near the micelle surface. The surfactant (S+)-silica interaction in S+X 11 is mediated by the counterion X-. The micelle-counterion interaction is in thermodynamic equilibrium. Thus the factors involved in determining the total rate of nanostructure formation are the counterion adsorption equilibrium of X on the micellar surface, surface-enhanced concentration of I+, and proton-catalysed silica condensation near the micellar surface. From consideration of the surfactant, the surfactants first form micelles as a combination of the S+X assemblies, which then form a liquid crystal with molecular silicate species, and finally the mesoporous material is formed through inorganic polymerization and condensation of the silicate species. In the S+X I+ model, the surfactant-to-counteranion... 

Silica materials have been studied extensively because of the structural flexibility of silica (through Si04 tetrahedral connections), easy control of hydrolysis and polymerization of silica species, high thermal stability of silica framework, easy modification of the silica surface, and well known silica and zeolite chemistry. Amorphous silica is also the main inorganic component for certain natural materials obtained from bioassembly, such as diatoms. Various mesoporous silica materials have been reported, which are very important for both fundamental research and applications. 

The oldest reported microporous membranes are based on carbon and are obtained by controlled pyrolysis of suitable polymeric precursors. Koresh and Soffer were the first to report properties of these membranes in a series of papers starting in 1980 (see refs, in Ref. [78]. Recently Linkov et al. [79] improved this method and arrived at mesoporous asymmetric hollow-fibre carbon membranes which could be transformed to microporous systems by coating the carbon membrane by e.g. vapour deposition polymerisation of polyimide forming precursors. 

For amorphous silica layers the s)mthesis process is similar to that used for mesoporous membranes, except that now solutions of ultra small, polymeric silica particles, with fractal dimensions smaller than 1.5-2.0, are used as precursors. These are produced with a set of specific synthesis conditions (e.g. high acidity to control the relative rates of the hydrolysis and condensation reactions). 

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