Novel organic-inorganic hybrid and nano-structured materials

Organic polymers, i.e. polymethacrylates and polystyrene, and inorganic silica were successfully integrated covalently into one body, i.e. hybrid materials, at molecular level in a continuum ranging from pure polymer to pure silica via the sol-gel process. The synthetic conditions have been systematically studied and optimized. A fast and convenient method for the synthesis of polymethacrylate-silica hybrids with significantly low volume-shrinkages has been developed to address the intrinsic problems of the sol-gel process, i.e. large volume shrinkage and long drying times. The relationship of properties of the hybrids with the structures and organic-inorganic compositions have been established. The density, hardness and thermal stability increase with the silica content. Atomic force microscopy study of the morphology shows that the transparent hybrid materials, in which the polymer chains have a strong and intimate interaction with the silica matrix, have significantly different surface features from a translucent control sample. The compressive behavior of the hybrid materials is completely different from that of traditional composites. Toughness of the hybrid materials can be maximized and the strength can be dramatically increased by varying the silica content. Possible mechanisms for the formation of hybrid materials are proposed. Potential applications of the hybrid materials as dental fillers and cation exchangers were investigated. Amorphous silica was functionalized by doping with optically active compounds such as scD-glucose, diphenyl tartaric acid and maltose. The resultant nano-structured materials show excellent optical transparency to visible light. Optical rotation of the materials in the solid state was demonstrated quantitatively to be the same as that in solution. The specific rotation can be calculated directly according to Biot's equation. A non-surfactant templating approach has been developed for the preparation of mesoporous silica by removing the organic compounds (i.e. template) through solvent extraction. The mesoporous nature of the materials is evidenced by the large BET surface area and pore volumes, the controllable pore sizes of ~2 to 6 nm and their narrow distributions, the powder X-ray diffraction patterns, and transmission electron microscopy images. The pore size can be tuned simply by adjusting the template concentration. This non-surfactant structure-directing pathway possesses many advantages over the known surfactant approaches.