Preparation of mesoporous silica templated metal nanowire films on foamed nickel substrates

A method has been developed for the formation of high surface area nanowire films on planar and three-dimensional metal electrodes. These nanowire films are formed via electrodeposition into a mesoporous silica film. The mesoporous silica films are formed by a sol–gel process using Pluronic tri-block copolymers to template mesopore formation on both planar and three-dimensional metal electrodes. Surface area increases of up to 120-fold have been observed in electrodes containing a templated film when compared to the same types of electrodes without the templated film.