Freeze cast fabrication of porous ceramics using tert-butyl alcohol-water crystals as template

Tert-butyl alcohol (TBA)-water (H2O) crystals are used as template to fabricate aligned porous alumina with special pore structures. Alumina slurries were prepared using TBA-H2O mixtures, which could undergo continuous crystallization by unidirectional freezing. The pore shape of porous alumina constantly changed from lamellar to snowflake, dendritic, needle-like, and hexagonal with the increase in the TBA content in alumina slurries. The hexagonal porous structure obtained by pure TBA slurry exhibited the best mechanical properties, whereas the mixture structure with irregular pore walls showed the worst, exhibiting inferior properties to lamellar pore structures.