Preparation of mesoporous MgO: phenomena occurred during the calcination^*

¹ School of Chemical Engineering, Hanoi University of Science and Technology, 1 Dai Co Viet, Hanoi, Vietnam
² Department of Material Engineering and Industrial Technology, University of Trento, v. Mesiano 77, 38050 Povo-Trento, Italy
³ VNU University of Science, Hanoi, Vietnam
⁴ Faculty of Technical Physics and Nanotechnology, VNU University of Engineering and Technology, Hanoi, Vietnam

^a e-mail: tthongkhcn@gmail.com

Received: 3 January 2013
Revised: 21 July 2013
Accepted: 23 September 2013
Published online: 25 October 2013

Abstract

Mesoporous MgO has been synthesized in the presence of the neutral block co-polymer surfactant Pluronic F127. The characterization of synthesized material was carried out by mean of X-ray diffraction (XRD), scanning electron microscope (SEM) and Brunauer-Emmett-Teller technique (BET). The obtained MgO exhibited a value of the surface area of 157 m²/g and showed a narrow pore size distribution centered at 4.3 nm. The phenomena and gas evolved during calcinations have been investigated by thermogravimeter-mass spectrometer (TG-MS). During the calcinations, the precursor Mg(OH)₂ was converted to MgO with a mass loss of 29% and with the formation of H₂O (>60% of the gas evolved). The desorption of CO₂ and a small amount of CO and/or N₂ which were adsorbed from air on the surface of Mg(OH)₂ were also observed. No organic compounds were found which indicated that F127 was completely removed by Soxhlet extraction.