Synthesis of 1D Fe₃O₄/P(MBAAm-co-MAA) nanochains as stabilizers for Ag nanoparticles and templates for hollow mesoporous structure, and their applications in catalytic reaction and drug delivery.

One-dimensional (1D) magnetic Fe3O4/P(MBAAm-co-MAA) nanochains were prepared by distillation-precipitation polymerization of MBAAm and MAA in the presence of Fe3O4 nanoparticles as building blocks under a magnetic heating stirrer, which played two critical roles: serving as magnetic field to induce the self-assembly of Fe3O4 nanoparticles into 1D nanochains and providing thermal energy to induce the polymerization of MAA and MBAAm on the surface of the Fe3O4 nanoparticles. The thickness of the P(MBAAm-co-MAA) layer can be easily tuned by adjusting the successive polymerization steps. The polymer layer that contained carboxyl groups was used as stabilizers for loading Ag nanoparticles and the reaction locus for deposition of outer silica layer via a sol-gel method in presence of C18TMS as the pore directing agent for tri-layer nanochains.

Synthesis of poly(methacrylic acid)-manganese oxide dihydroxide/silica core-shell and the corresponding hollow microspheres.

Poly(methacrylic acid)-MnO(OH)2/SiO2 core-shell microspheres were prepared by sol-gel hydrolysis of tetraethylorthosilicate (TEOS) in the presence of poly(methacrylic acid)-Mn(II) (PMAA-Mn(2+)) as template with ammonium hydroxide anion as catalyst and n-octadecyltrimethoxysilane (C18TMS) as pore-directing reagent. The PMAA-Mn(2+) core was prepared by incubation of Mn(2+) cations with PMAA microspheres via the coordination between carboxylate anion group on PMAA microsphere and Mn(2+) cations. During this process, the Mn(II) species were formed as white Mn(OH)2 precipitates at first, which were subsequently oxidized into brown MnO(OH)2 in air.