Template wetting, polymeric solution

Only few attempts have been made to rationally design the mesoscopic fine structure of nanotubes fabricated by wetting nanoporous hard templates with polymeric solutions. Chen et al. infiltrated solutions of PS-fo-PAN in DMF into AAO. As described above, the PAN was at first crosslinked and then carbonized. However, the PS domains were converted into holes, and porous amorphous carbon nanotubes could be fabricated [89]. hi a similar approach, Rodriguez et al. used a solution of PS-fo-PVP and carbohydrates associated with the PVP blocks via hydrogen bonds in DMF into AAO and obtained mesoporous amorphous carbon nanotubes with the positions of the mesopores determined by the positions of the PS domains. Solvent annealing of the BCP/hydrocarbon films in DMF/benzene vapor led to a significantly... 

On the one hand, template wetting with polymeric solutions is, up to now, poorly understood and difficult to perform in a reproducible manner under well-defined conditions. On the other hand, solution wetting offers a plethora of possibilities to generate one-dimensional nanostructures exhibiting complex morphologies and fine structures. To this end, as discussed in Sect. 5, mixtures of functional materials or precursors thereof in a common solvent... 

Most of the work that has been carried out using porous membranes as hard templates was done on porous alumina (anodic aluminium oxide, AAO) or track-etched polycarbonate membranes. The general principle of nanotube formation relies on a continuous polymer film being formed on the inside of the pores that remains as a tubular structure once the template is removed. There are several possibilities as to how this polymer film can be formed inside the pore. A film can be obtained by wetting the pore with a polymer melt or a polymer solution. Alternatively, the polymerization of monomers... 

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