Sol-gel with phase separation. Hierarchically porous materials optimized for high-performance liquid chromatography separations.

Sol-gel processes for fabricating oxides or metalloxane polymers with controlled porous structures have been reviewed. Gel materials having controlled macropores are synthesized by polymerization-induced phase separation and concurrent sol-gel transition in a variety of chemical compositions. Several variations of tailoring mesopore structures within the macroporous materials are introduced, which enable one to design hierarchically porous metal oxide and metalloxane polymer materials. Applications of monolithic silica gels having hierarchical macro/mesoporous structure to the separation media of high-performance liquid chromatography, HPLC, are described.