Scalable Fabrication of Resilient SiC Nanowires Aerogels with Exceptional High-Temperature Stability.
De LuLei SuHongjie WangMin NiuLiang XuMingbo MaHongfei GaoZhixin CaiXingyu FanPublished in: ACS applied materials & interfaces (2019)
Resilient ceramic aerogels exhibit great potential for applications in harsh environments owing to their unique combination of ultrahigh porosity, lightweight, reversible compressibility, and good thermal and chemical stabilities. However, their applications are severely restricted by the limited size and low yield due to their complicated and time-consuming synthetic procedures. Herein, we developed an efficient method for large-scale production of resilient SiC nanowire aerogels (SiC NWAGs) with tunable densities and desired shapes. The as-synthesized SiC NWAGs displayed excellent high-temperature stability (the maximum working temperature in Ar and air can reach to 1400 and 1000 °C, respectively), outstanding flame-erosion resistance and low thermal conductivity (25 mW m-1 K-1). The easy fabrication of such ceramic aerogel on a large scale will pave the way for the widespread applications of ceramic aerogels.