Abstract
Abstract Polymer aerogels can be produced using two very different processes. The supercritical carbon dioxide process follows that originally devised for producing silica aerogels, retaining the wet gel structure to produce aerogels that allows for nanometer‐scale features. Significant amounts of solvent handling, relatively high expenses, and potentially significant environmental concerns are associated with the supercritical processing method. The alternative, freeze‐drying process generates morphologies from the freezing step itself, reflecting the gel structure to a lesser extent than is seen with supercritical processing. Aerogel structures are more tunable with freeze drying, but the available morphological features are generally on the micrometer scale, resulting in thermal and mechanical properties more like those of traditional polymer foams. Regardless of the process employed, polymer aerogels are low density materials that offer a wide and increasing range of available properties with which to design products.
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