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. 2011 Apr 13;6(1):330.
doi: 10.1186/1556-276X-6-330.

A combination of hard and soft templating for the fabrication of silica hollow microcoils with nanostructured walls

Carlos Rodriguez-Abreu  1 , Neus Vilanova, Conxita Solans, Masaki Ujihara, Toyoko Imae, Arturo López-Quintela, Seiji Motojima
Affiliations

A combination of hard and soft templating for the fabrication of silica hollow microcoils with nanostructured walls

Carlos Rodriguez-Abreu et al. Nanoscale Res Lett. .

Abstract

Hollow silica microcoils have been prepared by using functionalized carbon microcoils as hard templates and surfactant or amphiphilic dye aggregates as soft templates. The obtained materials have been characterized by electron and optical microscopy, nitrogen sorption and small angle X-ray scattering. The obtained hollow microcoils resemble the original hard templates in shape and size. Moreover, they have mesoporous walls (pore size ≈ 3 nm) with some domains where pores are ordered in a hexagonal array, originated from surfactant micelles. The obtained silica microcoils also show preferential adsorption of cationic fluorescent dyes. A mechanism for the formation of silica microcoils is proposed.

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Figures

Figure 1
Figure 1
SEM images (a, b) CMC-COOH before silica coating, (c) microcoil after silica-coating and calcination. The initial weight ratios for the silica coating process were CTAB/NH3(aq.)/CMC-COOH/TEOS = 13.9/70.4/0.6/15.1. The black arrows indicate silica particles adhered to the coils whereas white arrows indicate translucid coil sections.
Figure 2
Figure 2
Optical microscopic images of (a) CMC-COOH and (b) hollow silica microcoil prepared using CTAB.
Figure 3
Figure 3
TEM images of different sections of silica hollow microcoils. The initial weight ratios for the silica coating process were CTAB/NH3(aq.)/CMC-COOH/TEOS = 13.7/69.4/2.0/14.9.
Figure 4
Figure 4
Visible and fluorescent microscopic images of hollow silica microcoils prepared using CTAB after soaking them in an aqueous solution of rhodamine B.
Figure 5
Figure 5
Silica microcoils prepared using PDI. (a) Molecular structure of PDI. (b) SEM image of silica microcoils at PDI/CMC-COOH ratio = 3; the arrows indicate elongated particles adhered to the coils. (c, d) SEM image of silica microcoils at PDI/CMC-COOH ratio = 0.2. The other initial weight ratios for the silica coating process were NH3(aq.)/CMC-COOH/TEOS = 300/0.37/10.1.
Figure 6
Figure 6
Proposed scheme for the mechanism of formation of hollow silica microcoils.
See this image and copyright information in PMC

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