Tuning morphology of mesoporous titanium oxides through fluorinated surfactants-based systems

Abstract

Four different fluorinated surfactant-based systems were used as template for the synthesis of highly ordered TiO2 mesoporous materials with large-pore wormhole structures. The calcined materials exhibit large pore diameters (up to 5.9 nm), high surface areas (900?1,180 m2 g-1), pore volumes (0.90?1.25 cm3 g-1) and thick pore walls (4.6?7.7 nm) depending of the synthesis route. It is established that the self-aggregation behavior of fluorinated amphiphile systems can be manipulate and provides a rich phase behavior to obtain well-organized titania sieves with adjustable pore size and surface topography. By comparison to titania and silica sieves obtained by the same procedure, it can be established that there is a deep interaction between head groups of fluorinated surfactants and Ti(IV)(iPrO)4 showing that the inorganic precursor has a great influence on the properties of the final materials.