Dear seniors and colleagues.
I need a guide on a source of hydrophilic grade of nanosilica. We currently run a material development project in which we need to disperse nanosilica in water before use. However, the sources we got so far have grades of nanosilica that does not disperse in water (hydrophobic type). We will dearly appreciate if anyone can help. This is very critical!
Thanks a lot.
They should be highly commercially available. Unless otherwise treated silica is naturally hydrophilic. I have attached a link for 200nm porous silica nanoparticles by Sigma (link 1). They are also quite easy to synthesize using the Stöber process (see link 2).
http://www.sigmaaldrich.com/catalog/product/aldrich/748161?lang=fr®ion=FR
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/St%C3%B6ber_process
Try silane coupling agents... literally hundreds of these available in market.
Unless you use products based on Stöber-synthesis, e.g. Ludox, you will always have some problems with aggregates/agglomerates. It seems to me your problem is that you try to disperse dry powders into water. Despite these are hydrophilic you will have problems with aggregates formed due to interparticle Si-O bridges. Best to use dispersions in water.
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