Synthesis and characterization of very high surface area, ordered meso-porous silicas

Highly-ordered silica materials with uniform, meso-porous structures (1.6/1.8/3.7 nm), very high surface areas (similar to1700 m(2)/g) and excellent thermal stability have been assembled by biomimetic pathways using surfactant templates as structure-directing agents. The resulting silicas exhibited framework pores of 1.6 - 3.7 nm diameter, 0.4 - 0.9 cm(3)/g volume and BET surface area 800 - 1700 m(2)/g. Nonionic copolymer surfactants could effectively mediate the construction of large pore (5 - 6 nm) silica. The approach demonstrated a wide range of possibilities in tailoring the structures of silicas synthesized using convenient reagents. Such mesoporous silica materials may have applications in large-molecule catalysis, chemical adsorption, bio-molecule separations and drug-delivery.