Abstract

Polymeric materials can be fabricated to include very large volumes of empty space, easily greater than 99% of the sample volume. A variety of methods is available to prepare such materials; these methods can roughly be classified as templating or non-templating, depending on whether the precursor system is two- or one-phase at the beginning of the pore-forming process. Depending on the method used, the resulting pores can range in diameter from micropores (< 2nm) to mesopores (2-50 nm) and macropores (> 50 nm). The pores can be highly interconnected, resulting in low density materials (e.g. foams), or discrete, where the pore-forming phase remains rapped within the matrix. This lecture will discuss different approaches to highly porous materials, how the porosity can be investigated and applications of the resulting materials.