Flame Aerosol Synthesis Enters a New Era

Engineers from the University at Buffalo have developed a new, user-friendly flame aerosol system that is more cost-effective than existing techniques.

Humans have been using fire to turn raw materials into useful products since the beginning of civilization. Examples include converting silica into glass and clay into pottery using flames.

Today, the industry employs a highly advanced process known as flame aerosol synthesis to Nanoparticle production, which is an essential component in everything from air filters to inks.

Notwithstanding its efficiency, flame aerosol synthesis has a number of disadvantages, such as challenges managing the flame synthesis, attaining accurate control over the size and dispersion of nanoparticles, and related expenses.

The latest study, which was published in Nature Communications on October 30, 2024, describes how the research team employed this method to create metal-organic frameworks (MOFs), which are porous nanomaterials used in a variety of industries, such as medicine, energy, the environment, and health.

A liquid chemical process is used to make most MOFs. Even though this process works well, it may be expensive and time-consuming, particularly when creating materials with a lot of crystallinity.

On the other hand, the flame aerosol technology just needs one step, which might save a lot of money and time. Although the MOFs made using this process are less porous than conventional MOFs, researchers believe that their special qualities—such as their small grain size, short-range ordered structures, and high thermal stability—may help create new advanced materials and industrial uses.

In addition to avoiding thermodynamic challenges, the flame aerosol system enables the combination of any two metal elements to create a single MOF with particular characteristics suitable for energy storage, catalysis, sensing, and other applications.