Rapid and precise doping of mesoporous silica beads has been achieved with luminescent quantum dots, leading to 1-2 orders of magnitude improvements over the results previously achieved with polystyrene latex beads. A surprising finding is that multivalent hydrophobic interactions provide a strong driving force for efficient partitioning and immobilization of surfactant-coated quantum dots in t...

This work presents research on the effects of polycaprolactone (PCL) and PCL modified with silica (Si2) nanoparticles, on the color change of offset printed paperboard. The nanocomposite was prepared with three different concentrations (1%, 2% and 3%) of SiO2, and applied in four different coating thicknesses (4 μm, 24 μm, 40 μm and 80 μm). The color values of the printed sample were measured b...

The present study attempts to incorporate methacrylate-based polymers into ordered lamellar organic/inorganic nanocomposite films composed of alternating SiO2/polymer layers. The films are prepared by dip-coating from a solution containing the monomers and silica precursors, thus leading to composite lamellar mesostructured materials through evaporation-induced self-assembly (EISA). A polymeriz...

Magnetic nanoparticles are frequently coated with SiO2 to improve their functionality and bio-compatibility in a range of biomedical and polymer nanocomposite applications. In this paper, a scalable flame aerosol technology is used to produce highly dispersible, superparamagnetic iron oxide nanoparticles hermetically coated with silica to retain full magnetization performance. Iron oxide partic...

Thermoresponsive nanocomposite thin films composed of alternating layers of silica and polymerized N-isopropylacrylamide (NIPAM) or NIPAM plus dodecyl methacrylate (DM) hydrogels were prepared by surfactant-directed evaporation-induced self-assembly (EISA). During EISA, the organic monomers partition within the hydrophobic domains of a lamellar mesophase. In-situ polymerization via a free radic...

Mesoporous silica has been used as a heterogeneous support for catalysts; however, asymmetric induction by the helicity of inorganic mesoporous silica itself has not yet been achieved. P- and M-helical mesoporous silica was found to act as a chiral inorganic trigger for asymmetric autocatalysis to afford (S) and (R)-pyrimidyl alkanol with >99.5% ee, respectively.