The preparation process of silica aerogels has commonly involved a dangerous supercritical drying step, so work has been done to eliminate this step. This paper discusses the preparation of composite silica aerogels containing silica fibers using a method that excludes the supercritical drying step. The physical and thermal properties of these aerogels were subsequently examined. It was found that the composite aerogels produced by the method presented in the article ...
Author(s): Teng Huang, Xiaoyong He, Xuan Cheng, Ying Zhang, Zaidong Shao, Ziwei Niu
The potential for the use of silica aerogels doped with TiO2 nanowires as thermal insulators was evaluated. It was found that the TiO2-doped aerogels showed good thermal insulation properties and that other desirable properties were retained upon the addition of TiO2 nanowires....
Author(s): Chao Hao Peng, Hong Yi Gao, Xiong Peng, Yi Luan, Zhao Kui Jin
The researchers used an instrument to measure the thermal properties (thermal conductivity and specific heat) of anisotropic thermally insulating foams produced by the mixing of nanocellulose, graphene oxide and sepiolite nanorods via the freeze-casting method. These anisotropic foams showed superior thermal properties when compared to expanded polystyrene (a common insulation material), and had a thermal conductivity value of 0.015 W/mK which is half the value for expanded polystyrene. Not only ...
Author(s): Andraz Kocjan, Bernd Wicklein, Federico Carosio, German Salazar-Alvarez, Giovanni Camino, Lennart Bergstrom, Markus Antonietti
In order to improve the brittleness and shrinkage experienced by carbon aerogels during the drying process, carbon fibers were added to the aerogel. Supercritical drying was used in order to generate the aerogels, and a machine was used to measure the thermal conductivity of the synthesized aerogels. This new method resulted in crack-free carbon fiber reinforced aerogel composites and may lead to more applications for carbon aerogels....
Author(s): Changrui Zhang, Jian Feng, Junzong Feng
A one step polymer-incorporation sol-gel process coupled with a surface modification and ambient pressure drying process was developed to synthesize silica-poly(vinylpyrrolidone) composites aerogels. The properties that were investigated were: hydrophobicity, mechanical strength and thermal conductivity at high temperatures. The authors envisioned the use of these polymer composites in energy saving areas with large scale production....
Author(s): Shih-Yuan Lu, Te-Yu Wei, Yu-Cheng Chang
