Novel template confinement derived from polybenzoxazine-based carbon xerogels for synthesis of ZSM-5 nanoparticles via microwave irradiation

Polybenzoxazine, a new class of phenolic resin, has been successfully synthesized via a facile quasi-solventless method and used as a starting material for producing nano-porous carbon with pore sizes of about 40–200 nm. This porous carbon is prepared via a sol–gel process, using dioxane as a solvent (CXDI) and is used as a hard template confinement to produce crystalline nanosized MFI or ZSM-5 with a molar composition of 10Na2O:200SiO2:Al2O3:20TPABr:12,600H2O via hydrothermal microwave irradiation technique within 6 h of synthesis time. The XRD patterns show a well-ordered crystalline phase of nanosized ZSM-5. In addition, FTIR result shows the weak absorption band at 550 cm−1, indicating the presence of nanosized ZSM-5. Particle size distribution obtained from dynamic light scattering and TEM images reveal that the crystal size of ZSM-5 synthesized using CXDI as a hard template (ZSM-5-CXDI) is in the range of 27–70 nm. ZSM-5-CXDI also shows large external surface area of 217 m2/g.

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► Polybenzoxazine (PBZ) is a good candidate resin to produce carbon xerogel.
► PBZ-based carbon xerogel can be prepared within the shorter preparation time.
► Highly controllable pore size of PBZ-based carbon xerogel.
► ZSM-5 nanoparticles with inter- and intra-mesopore.
► Facile synthesis of ZSM-5 nanoparticles via microwave irradiation.