Cation alkyl polyglycoside for preparation of mesoporous silica and direct synthesis of mesoporous carbon

Using industrial grade cation alkyl polyglycoside as structure-directing agent, a new low-cost route has been developed to prepare ordered mesoporous silica through inorganic-organic self-assembling in weak basic aqueous solution. The XRD patterns, TEM images and the corresponding BET analysis show that it has a worm-like mesostructure with narrow pore size distribution centered at 3.6 nm. Moreover, alkyl polyglucoside can be used as carbon precursor, and the direct pyrolysis of silica/cation alkyl polyglucoside composite with trace amount H₂SO₄ as catalyst can lead to the formation of mesoporous carbon material, which shows the excellent performance in adsorbing fuchsine from aqueous solution.