Inorganic porous material and process for making same
AssigneeMerck Patent GmbH
InventorsKazuki Nakanishi, Nachiro Soga
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Abstract
A process for producing inorganic porous materials is disclosed. The materials prepared by this process are favorably applied to producing columns for chromatography, porous filters for separating blood, porous catalysts, or enzyme supports. These materials have interconnected continuous macropores with a median diameter larger than 0.1 .mu.m. A preferred embodiment of said materials contains additionally mesopores in the walls of said macropores, said mesopores having a median diameter between 2 and 100 nm.
Claims16
An inorganic porous material comprising a glass or glass-ceramic having interconnected continuous macropores with a median diameter larger than 0.1 .mu.m and having mesopores with a median diameter of 2 to 100 nm on the walls of said macropores.
A process for the preparation of an inorganic porous material comprising a glass or glass-ceramic having interconnected continuous macropores with a median diameter larger than 0.1 .mu.m and having mesopores with a median diameter of 2 to 100 nm in the walls of said macropores, which comprises:
- (a) preparing a gel having three dimensional interconnected phase domains, one phase domain being predominantly solvent and another phase domain being predominantly inorganic material with surface pores;
- (b) immersing the gel in a liquid capable of dissolving the inorganic material;
- (c) removing the liquid by evaporation drying and heat treatment;
- and
- (d) calcining the gel to form the inorganic porous material.
Dependencies are inferred from the claim text.