Abstract
Porous materials account for billions of dollars in annual sales and are used in a wide variety of applications including filtration and purification media (air, water, molten metal, polymer); catalyst structural support; sensors (gas, chemical, particulate); thermal insulation; low density structural members; and waterproof breathable fabrics just to name a few. Many methods have been developed in the past to produce porous materials. In this paper, we discuss a novel procedure for making nano and micro porous ceramic materials using biological agents (which could include fungi, bacteria and viruses) in conjunction with nano-sized ceramic particles. The porosity in these systems has been produced by one of two distinct methods -biologically derived gas production and biological templating. These porous structures have been formed in various ceramic compositions using a variety of micro and nano-sized ceramic particles including silicon carbide, silicon dioxide and silicon nitride. The results presented include characterization of the porous samples by optical microscopy and scanning electron microscopy.
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