Biotemplating of inorganic functional materials from polysaccharides

Abstract

Biomacromolecules control and direct the formation of biominerals and hard tissues in nature. In many cases, polysaccharides are involved during the assembly of the inorganic phase as template. Natural and regenerated polysaccharides exhibit a hierarchical multiscale order as well as self-assembly properties and they appear in a large variety of accessible structures. Therefore, the application of polysaccharide-based structures and composites is a promising approach for the formation of patterned and hierarchically structured inorganic functional and structural materials. The authors report on recent advancements on the biotemplated formation of inorganic functional materials using polysaccharides. Owing to their structural diversity, polysaccharides can be used at various levels from the molecular scale up to complex three-dimensional parts. The versatility of polysaccharide templating is shown on one-dimensional (1D) cellulose nanocrystals for formation of inorganic nanotubes. Two-dimensional (2D) Langmuir–Blodgett films of cellulose and cellulose derivatives are used as reference templates to investigate the mineralization behaviour of inorganic phases from supersaturated solutions. The development of optical and photocatalytic materials from plant tissues (wood and Juncaceae) is presented. In innovative route, phototactic microalgae are used as biotemplates for the mineralization of inorganic phases on their exopolysaccharides, which provide novel pathways for the fabrication of a variety of functional materials.

Mesoporous Alumina from Colloidal Biotemplating of Al Clusters

“…Recent biotemplating approaches [2] have demonstrated the interest of this strategy using biological material either as a preformed multi-scale mold in replication processes, [3] either as an elemental brick in co-assembly processes. [1] For this purpose, the use of matter of biological origin, and particularly from biomass, is obviously advantageous.…”

“…These were Al(H 2 O) 6 3 + monomers (named Al 1 for the sake of simplicity), Al 2 (OH) 2 24 18 + tricontamers in equilibrium with smaller Al 13 cations. These were Al(H 2 O) 6 3 + monomers (named Al 1 for the sake of simplicity), Al 2 (OH) 2 24 18 + tricontamers in equilibrium with smaller Al 13 cations.…”

Cellulose‐Based Biotemplated Silica Structuring

“…[234] These include whiskers, [235] fibers and nanofibers, [236][237][238][239] percolating nanofiber arrangements, [240] transparent nanofiber sheets, [240] cellulose fibers, [241] and sheets [120,203] regenerated from solution as well as nematic cellulose nanorod suspensions. [234] These include whiskers, [235] fibers and nanofibers, [236][237][238][239] percolating nanofiber arrangements, [240] transparent nanofiber sheets, [240] cellulose fibers, [241] and sheets [120,203] regenerated from solution as well as nematic cellulose nanorod suspensions.…”

Biomimetic Growth of Hydroxyapatite on Kenaf Fibers

“…The absence of net charge is not favourable for any HA growth. Therefore, the use of a chelating agent that can bind the metal ions during the SBF immersion is vital (Zollfrank et al 2012). Citric acid is a strong chelating agent for bonding calcium ions to its carboxylic groups; it promotes HA nucleation in a 1.5 SBF solution (Rhee and Tanaka 2000;Sánchez-Ferrero et al 2015) and exists in its citrate form in fresh bone (Costello et al 2014).…”