Defects in mesoporous materials

What is it about?

Mesoporous silicas are industrially relevant materials because of their high specific surface area and the large diameter of their pores, suitable for the absorption of large organic molecules. The pores form a regular pattern, but the silica walls separating the pores are amorphous; so, it is very difficult to have detailed information on the structure of these walls by experimental techiques. In this work, we used modeling techniques to simulate the amorphous silica walls of mesoporous materials. In particular, we considered different kinds of structural defects, calculated their electronic and vibrational spectra, and compared them with available experimental data. This strategy allowed us to gather insight on the type of defect centers on these important materials.

Featured Image

Why is it important?

We built plausible models of the defect centers and systematically analyzed them in terms of their vibrational and electronic properties. For the first time, also radical species were considered. We found that all the model defect structures were compatible with experimental results. A rich, complex picture of the pores surface emerges: different kinds of defects are simultaneously present, and are largely responsible of the interesting properties of these materials, including their reactivity. In particular, we concluded that a very reactive defect, known as 'strained siloxane bridge', should actually have radical nature.

Perspectives