Preparation of Porous Magnetic Nanocomposite Materials Using Highly Concentrated Emulsions as Templates

Iron oxide nanoparticles (NPs) with a size of 3 and 10 nm were used to prepare porous hybrid magnetic nanocomposite materials via polymerization in highly concentrated water-in-oil (w/o) emulsions. The NPs were dispersed in a monomer mixture (styrene-divinylbenzene), which was then polymerized to obtain porous solid monoliths with embedded magnetic nanoparticles. The NPs were characterized using x-ray diffraction (XRD), scanning electron microscopy (SEM) and transmission electron microscopy (TEM). The results showed that the nanocomposites contain a high pore volume fraction, with pores of size around 1-10 mu m, surrounded by thin polymer walls containing homogeneously distributed nanoparticles. Porous nanocomposites can be attracted to a strong permanent magnet.