A novel pathway for synthesis of silica hollow spheres with mesostructured walls

A novel double-template route to synthesize silica hollow spheres with mesostructured walls using nano-sized calcium carbonate particles as inorganic templates and cationic surfactant as organic templates at room temperature was presented. X-ray diffraction (XRD), nitrogen adsorption, and transmission electron microscopy (TEM) were employed to characterize the morphologies and mesostructures of the as-prepared silica hollow spheres. The effect of inorganic template/surfactant ratio on the pore structure of the hollow spheres was studied. Experimental results indicated that the hollow spheres had an average diameter of nearly 40 nm with a surface area of ∼766–1050 m2/g. [Copyright &y& Elsevier]