Université de Fribourg

Reinforced and superinsulating silica aerogel through in situ cross-linking with silane terminated prepolymers

Iswar, Subramaniam ; Snellings, Geert M. B. F. ; Zhao, Shanyu ; Erni, Rolf ; Bahk, Yeon Kyoung ; Wangd, Jing ; Lattuada, Marco ; Koebel, Matthias M. ; Malfait, Wim J.

In: Acta Materialia, 2018, vol. 147, p. 322–328

Silica aerogels have only half the thermal conductivity of conventional insulation, but their application potential is limited by the poor mechanical properties. The fragility arises from the thin necks between the silica nanoparticle building blocks. Here, we produce strong silica aerogels through co-gelation of the polyethoxydisiloxane precursor with a variety of silane terminated...

Université de Fribourg

Effect of aging on silica aerogel properties

Iswar, Subramaniam ; Malfait, Wim J. ; Balog, , Sandor ; Winnefeld, Frank ; Lattuada, Marco ; Koebel, Matthias M.

In: Microporous and Mesoporous Materials, 2017, vol. 241, p. 293–302

Silica aerogels’ unique physical and chemical properties make them fascinating materials for a wide variety of applications. In addition to hydrophobization by silylation, aging is very important in the synthesis of silica aerogel by ambient pressure drying. Here we systematically study the effect of aging on the physico-chemical properties of silica aerogel with emphasis on ambient dried...