A novel strategy for the construction of silk fibroin–SiO_(2)composite aerogel with enhanced mechanical property and thermal insulation performance

作     者：Weixin Liu Bo Yin Jie Zhang Xingping Liu Wenxian Lian Shaokun Tang Weixin Liu;Bo Yin;Jie Zhang;Xingping Liu;Wenxian Lian;Shaokun Tang

作者机构：Key Laboratory for Green Chemical Technology of Ministry of EducationSchool of Chemical Engineering&TechnologyTianjin UniversityTianjin 300350China Xinte Energy Co.Ltd.Urumqi City 831499China 

出 版 物：《Frontiers of Chemical Science and Engineering》 (化学科学与工程前沿（英文版）)

年 卷 期：2023年第17卷第3期

页      面：288-297页

核心收录：

学科分类：081702[工学-化学工艺] 08[工学] 0817[工学-化学工程与技术] 0805[工学-材料科学与工程（可授工学、理学学位）] 0813[工学-建筑学] 0703[理学-化学] 0814[工学-土木工程] 

主　　题：silica aerogel silk fibroin impregnation thermal insulation mechanical property 

摘      要：The practical application of silica aerogels is an enormous challenge due to the difficulties in improving both mechanical property and thermal insulation performance.In this work,silk fibroin was used as scaffold to improve the mechanical property and thermal insulation performance of silica aerogels.The ungelled SiO_(2)precursor solution was impregnated into silk fibroin to prepare silk fibroin-SiO_(2)composite aerogels via sol−gel method followed by freeze-drying.By virtue of the interfacial hydrogen-bonding interactions and chemical reactions between silk fibroin and silica nanoparticles,SiO_(2)was well-dispersed in the silk fibroin aerogel and composite aerogels exhibited enhanced mechanical property.By increasing the loading of silk fibroin from 15 wt%to 21 wt%,the maximum compressive stress was enhanced from 0.266 to 0.508 MPa when the strain reached 50%.The thermal insulation performance of the composite aerogels was improved compared with pure silica aerogel,as evidenced that the thermal conductivity was decreased from 0.0668 to 0.0341 W∙m‒1∙K‒1.Moreover,the composite aerogels exhibited better hydrophobicity and fire retardancy compared to pure silica aerogel.Our work provides a novel approach to preparing silk fibroin-SiO_(2)composite aerogels with enhanced mechanical property and thermal insulation performance,which has potential application as thermal insulation material.