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Letter

Nature Materials 2, 159–163 (1 March 2003) | doi:10.1038/nmat838

Self-adjusted synthesis of ordered stable mesoporous minerals by acid|[ndash]|base pairs

Bozhi Tian , Xiaoying Liu , Bo Tu , Chengzhong Yu , Jie Fan , Limin Wang , Songhai Xie , Galen D. Stucky & Dongyuan Zhao

Although the chemical diversity of ordered composite mesoporous materials has been expanding during the past decade, progress has been limited by the need for a general synthetic approach that is predictive and makes use of well developed fundamental chemical principles. Researchers have previously used the interaction of organic–inorganic (OI) species that are present during the nucleation of the composite phase, and several synthesis pathways, such as direct surfactant–inorganic interaction (S+I|[minus]|, S|[minus]|I+, S0I0) and mediated interaction (S+X|[minus]|I+, S|[minus]|X+I|[minus]|), have been proposed.