A Designed Template Removal Method for Obtaining Mesoporous Films with Highly Ordered Structure by Rapid Thermal Processing Technique

The soft-templating methodology is a highly effectiveapproachto prepare ordered organic mesoporous structures. However, in thetraditional thermal-induced template removal process, the resultantmesoporous films often suffer from severe shrinkage, which causesa reduction in pore size and order. To overcome these limitations,we developed a strategy that combines rapid thermal processing (RTP)with dynamic circulation. This approach aims to optimize the orderedmesostructures of the films after template removal. The mesoporousstructure was evaluated by various analytical techniques, includingXRD, NMR, TEM, and grazing incident small angle X-ray scattering (GISAXS).Our results demonstrate that the dynamic thermal processing methodleads to a high-quality mesoporous films with significantly reducedshrinkage in the mesoporous structure. Specifically, the d-spacing of mesopores decreased only from 10.4 to 9.1 nm when treatedwith RTP, which is smaller than the mesoporous films treated usingtraditional heat processing (reduced to 7.7 nm). Furthermore, dynamiccycling led to an increase in the domain size of the ordered structurefrom 49.1 to 199.7 nm. These findings were confirmed by cross-sectionalTEM, consistent with the values obtained from the GISAXS analysis.Finally, we discuss the feasibility and efficiency of the proposedthermal treatment method, which can provide a straightforward approachto improve the ordered degree in mesoporous films.