On the impact of accessible surface and surface energy on particle formation and growth from the vapour phase

This work investigates effects of reduced accessible surface area of aggregate particles and surface energy on titania particle formation and growth. It is taken into consideration that surface-related growth mechanisms, i.e. surface reaction and condensation, are limited to the fraction of the surface area of primary particles which is exposed to the collision with single molecules. Surface energy data determine the critical particle size with respect to evaporation and values are varied within the published range. This implies to develop a model which considers "surface shielding" and accounts for the formation of stable clusters from a supersaturated vapour due to nucleation and condensation besides considering the generation of monomers due to chemical reaction, growth due to surface reaction, agglomeration and sintering. Taking the accessible surface area into account is found out to be especially important if agglomerates contain a large number of primary particles or if agglomerate structure is rather compact. In this case, precursor consumption and primary particle growth turn out to be significantly retarded. Surface energy data are shown to be decisive with respect to the thermodynamic barrier to the formation of particles, thus to active particle formation and growth mechanisms, besides affecting sintering kinetics. Elevated surface energy data typically retard precursor consumption and favour primary particle growth. (C) 2004 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.