The synthesis of MCM-41 nanomaterial from Algerian Bentonite: The effect of the mineral phase contents of clay on the structure properties of MCM-41

This study focuses on the MCM-41 material (Mobil Composition of Matter). The MCM-41 nanomaterial presents higher physical properties such as pore sizes, surface areas and pore volumes. This material is usually synthesized by using laboratory reagents as silicate sources and aluminium source. These laboratory reagents are still expensive and toxic for large scale production. The main aim of this work is to resolve this problem and to replace these expensive laboratory reagents by more cost effective ones. The volclay and Algerian bentonite low-cost mass clay materials are used as silicate and acuminate sources separately by adopting an alkaline fusion process to extract both silicon and aluminium (1 kg of silicium and aluminium from volclay and Algerian bentonite cost around 0.03 and 0.01 (sic) whereas the same amount of silicon from ludox and aluminium from sodium aluminates cost around 350 (sic)). The synthesis of MCM-41 from bentonite was carried out by the hydrothermal method using the supernatants of bentonite (in the form of sodium silicate and sodium aluminate). On the basis of the data obtained from powder X-ray diffraction (XRD), transmission electron microscopy (TEM) and N-2 adsorption and desorption, the results revealed that the properties of MCM-41 synthesized from Algerian bentonite and volclay separately depend on both elemental composition and mineral phase contents of the used bentonite. Pure and highly ordered hexagonal mesoporous MCM-41 with uniform pore sizes and a high specific surface area have been successfully synthesized without any phases which exist in natural bentonite. The Algerian bentonite was chosen because of its low cost compared to volclay, another commercial clay source. (C) 2013 Published by Elsevier Masson SAS on behalf of Academie des sciences.