Abstract
Mesoporous TiO2 and Fe3O4@mesoporous TiO2−x microspheres have been synthesized by coupling the template-directed-sol-gel-chemistry with the low-cost and environmentally benign spray-drying technique. As-made microspheres were observed in a size range of 500nm to 5μm, specific surface areas from 150 to 162m2g−1 and mean pore sizes of 4–6nm. Moreover, Fe3O4@mesoporous TiO2−x microspheres exhibited remarkable selective phosphopeptide enrichment activity. [Display omitted]
•Mesoporous TiO2 and Fe3O4@mesoporous TiO2−x microspheres have been synthesized by coupling template-directed-sol-gel-chemistry with the low-cost, scalable, and environmentally benign spray-drying process.•This strategy is lying on comparatively low spray-drying temperature (i.e. 170°C) with an additional post-ultrasonication route of the pre-calcined TiO2 samples.•As-synthesized mesoporous TiO2 microspheres posses a size distribution from 500nm to 5μm, specific surface areas ranging from 150 to 162m2g−1 and mean pore sizes of several nanometers (4–6nm).•As evidence, Fe3O4@mesoporous TiO2−x microspheres were analyzed to exhibit remarkable selective phosphopeptide-enrichment activity.
Mesoporous TiO2 has several potential applications due to its unique electronic and optical properties, although its structures and morphologies are typically difficult to tune because of its uncontrollable and fast sol-gel reaction. In this study we have coupled the template-directed-sol-gel-chemistry with the low-cost, scalable, and environmentally benign aerosol (spray-drying) one-pot preparation technique for the fabrication of hierarchically mesoporous TiO2 microspheres and Fe3O4@mesoporous TiO2−x microspheres in a large scale. Parameters during the pre-hydrolysis and spray-drying treatment were varied to successfully control the bead diameter, morphology, monodispersity, surface area and pore size for improving their effectiveness for better application. Unlike to the previous aerosol synthetic approaches, where mainly quite a high temperature gradient with the strict control of spray-drying precursor concentration is implied, our strategy is lying on comparatively low drying temperature with an additional post-ultrasonication (further hydrolysis and condensation) route of the pre-calcined TiO2 samples. As-synthesized mesoporous microspheres have a size distribution from 500nm to 5μm, specific surface areas ranging from 150 to 162m2g−1 and mean pore sizes of several nanometers (4–6nm). Further Fe3O4@mesoporous TiO2−x microspheres were observed to show remarkable selective phosphopeptide-enrichment activity which might have significant importance in disease diagnosis and other biomedical applications.