Simple synthesis for hierarchical SiO2 tubes with adjustable Mesoporous

Abstract

With the aid of cotton template and precursor solution of mesoporous silica, hierarchical mesoporous SiO 2 tubes with size-adjustable mesoporous in the tube-wall were synthesized through sol-gel method. The products are tubular silica that inherit the hierarchical structure of initial cotton and contain mesopores in their wall. The size of mesoporous in the wall can be adjusted by change the mixture ratio of mesoporous silica precursor solution. Noble metal particles, silver and gold, were introduced into the surface of mesoporous silica tubes respectively to obtain a uniform distribution of noble metal nanoparticles on the tube-wall. This method can be applied to many nature substance templates with different structures to prepare various structural SiO 2 materials.