Functionalization methods of SBA-15 mesoporous molecular sieve: a brief overview

Abstract

SBA-15 molecular mesoporous sieve has attracted great interest of researchers since its discovery in 1998, owing large area surface, well-defined pores, uniform pore size, high thermal and hydrothermal stability, well-defined pore structure and ability to be functionalized with diverse metal oxides (active phase of catalyst). This work contains a brief review of the main SBA-15 functionalization methods: direct synthesis, post-synthesis or post-grafting, deposition–precipitation, graft hybrid, colloid immobilization and nanoparticle encapsulation showing the advantages and disadvantages of each. We also approach some synthetic strategies to overcome the shortcomings of the mentioned methods, as well as some parameters to choose the best method. Here, we showed that these methods don’t provide the functionalization of SBA-15 keeping all the peculiar properties of support and that the new strategies or alternatives routes are important to overcome some challenges of the functionalization of SBA-15. This is a challenging point that needs to be further explored by promoting greater advances in materials science and catalysis.