Despite significant improvements in the synthesis of templated silica materials, post‐synthesis purification remains highly expensive and renders the materials industrially unviable. In this study this issue is addressed for porous bioinspired silica by developing a rapid room‐temperature solution method for complete extraction of organic additives. Using elemental analysis and N2 and CO2 adsorption, the ability to both purify and controllably tailor the composition, porosity and surface chemistry of bioinspired silica in a single step is demonstrated. For the first time the extraction is modelled using molecular dynamics, revealing that the removal mechanism is dominated by surface‐charge interactions. This is extended to other additive chemistry, leading to a wider applicability of the method to other materials. Finally the environmental benefits of the new method are estimated and compared with previous purification techniques, demonstrating significant improvements in sustainability.
The goal of the protocols described herein is to synthesize bioinspired silica materials, perform enzyme encapsulation therein, and partially or totally purify the same by acid elution. By combining sodium silicate with a polyfunctional bioinspired additive, silica is rapidly formed at ambient conditions upon neutralization. The effect of neutralization rate and biomolecule addition point on silica yield are investigated, and biomolecule immobilization efficiency is reported for varying addition point. In contrast to other porous silica synthesis methods, it is shown that the mild conditions required for bioinspired silica synthesis are fully compatible with the encapsulation of delicate biomolecules. Additionally, mild conditions are used across all synthesis and modification steps, making bioinspired silica a promising target for the scale-up and commercialization as both a bare material and active support medium.The synthesis is shown to be highly sensitive to conditions, i.e., the neutralization rate and final synthesis pH, however tight control over these parameters is demonstrated through the use of auto titration methods, leading to high reproducibility in reaction progression pathway and yield. Therefore, bioinspired silica is an excellent active material support choice, showing versatility towards many current applications, not limited to those demonstrated here, and potency in future applications.
Multi-scale modelling and experiments show that self-assembly of amine-templated silica occurs through charge-matching and not through the accepted neutral-templating mechanism.
We present ‘joined-up’ thinking for several families of porous silicas; the mechanistic insights gained can help design structurally complex materials.
scite is a Brooklyn-based organization that helps researchers better discover and understand research articles through Smart Citations–citations that display the context of the citation and describe whether the article provides supporting or contrasting evidence. scite is used by students and researchers from around the world and is funded in part by the National Science Foundation and the National Institute on Drug Abuse of the National Institutes of Health.