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Updated: Feb 14, 2026

Synthesis Method for Cellulose Nanofiber Biotemplated Palladium Composite Aerogels
Published on: May 9, 2019
Aerogel materials with periodic structures imprinted with cellulose nanocrystals
Yi-Tao Xu1, Yiling Dai, Thanh-Dinh Nguyen
1Department of Chemistry, University of British Columbia, 2036 Main Mall, Vancouver, British Columbia V6T 1Z1, Canada. mmaclach@chem.ubc.ca.
Abstract:
Novel aerogel materials with periodic structures derived from chiral nematic liquid crystalline cellulose nanocrystals (CNCs) are reported. The liquid crystalline structure of phase-separated CNCs is locked by a simple solvent exchange method or silica condensation. Both cellulose and silica/cellulose aerogel materials were obtained after critical point drying, and subsequent calcination of the silica/cellulose composite afforded a silica aerogel with periodic order. Gas adsorption and electron microscopy studies revealed that these materials have high surface areas and a unique chiral nematic structure imparted from the helicoidal CNC template. This is a new, scalable approach to aerogel materials with highly anisotropic structures. The high porosity and periodic, chiral features of these new materials may make them suitable for applications that require anisotropic properties or as hard templates for the construction of other ordered aerogels.
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