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Why do you think your paper is
highly cited?
The paper briefly summarizes, largely based on our own
research data, the template method for preparing porous
structures. Many emerging applications such as
nanotechnology, photonics, tissue engineering, and clean
energy require novel porous materials with a range of
well-defined physical and chemical properties.
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“In the past 20 years or so all my research
activities have been concerning template synthesis of porous
materials for various applications.” |
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The template method can, in most of the cases, afford new
porous materials with properties meeting the requirements of
the emerging applications. It is thus not unexpected that
the area has been booming in the past decade and many
literature papers describe how to use the template method to
create various porous materials.
Does it describe a new discovery, methodology, or synthesis of
knowledge?
The paper describes how the template method works for
various porous structures. It provides a short yet
informative summary of the recent research progress.
Would you summarize the significance of your paper in layman’s
terms?
In the paper, we first selectively chose some key members
of microporous materials to demonstrate how the template
method can be perfectly used to make them. We then discussed
the use of surfactant micelle-template to synthesize ordered
mesoporous materials, followed by using self-assembled
colloidal crystal template to prepare highly ordered
macroporous materials. Finally, we elaborated the
preparation of ordered porous carbons using hard templates.
How did you become involved in this research and were there any
particular problems encountered along the way?
I began my research life in the Dalian Institute of
Chemical Physics, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Dalian,
China, where I became interested in template synthesis of
zeolites. In the past 20 years or so all my research
activities have been concerning template synthesis of porous
materials for various applications.
Where do you see your research leading in the future?
Porous materials have found wide applications in
traditional fields such as catalysis, gas separation and
purification, and detergents. They are entering into
emerging areas as mentioned above. I strongly believe that
future technologies will need more and more porous
materials. I very often say that, as a researcher, I
consider myself lucky to be at work in this particular area.
(George) X. S. Zhao, Ph.D.
Associate Professor
Department of Chemical and Biomolecular Engineering
National University of Singapore
Singapore |
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