A research group from the Indian Association for the Cultivation of Science in Jadavpur, Kolkata, have developed a method for the production of mesoporous polymer/carbon nanospheres with faithful shape replication of the original sacrificial silica template via surface-confined atom transfer radical polymerization. The as-synthesized mesoporous polymer nanospheres have low dielectric constants and hence have potential use as a promising material in microelectronics.
Their approach also allows production of functional mesoporous polymer nanospheres for making “clickable” mesoporous nanospheres, removal of ionic contaminates through anion exchange, and glucose sensing, and may be extended for the facile fabrication of functional mesoporous polymer/carbon nanospheres of different shapes and sizes having potential use as highly promising materials for diverse applications, including chemical sensing, drug nanocarriers, catalysis, biomedical therapy and diagnosis, and environmental remediation.
