Effect of the amount of ppi in polymeric foam template to the microstructure of porous porcelain produced via polymeric foam replication method

Abstract

Porous porcelain has been produced using custom made polymeric sponges with different amount of linear pore per inch (ppi) 10, 20 and 45 ppi as template materials. SEM observation revealed the microstructure of porous porcelain is the replication of template materials and also confirmed the effect of the templates ppi to the microstructure of porous porcelain. The amounts of pores are increased whereas the pore sizes and the thickness cell wall or struts was increased as ppi increased. Highly porous porcelain with pores sizes greater than 100μm was successfully produced from these templates. This kind of porous structure is suitable for applications which require bigger pores sizes such as in catalyst support and porous biomaterials.