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Artefact peaks of pore size distributions caused by unclosed sorption isotherm and tensile strength effect

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Abstract

The pore size distribution (PSD) is an important property of the porous materials, but an accurate and reliable PSD is very difficult to obtain. Quenched Solid Density Functional Theory (QSDFT) is widely used to analyze the pore size distribution. Here, a series of unclosed and closed isotherms of activated carbon were measured and compared. The experimental results revealed the appearance of an artefact peak in the PSD for the unclosed isotherms by employing QSDFT equilibrium model. Moreover, the location of the artificial peak is highly related to the end point of the desorption branch. In addition, tensile strength effect (TSE) illustrates the limit of mechanical stability of liquids in pores, and subsequent cavitation generates an artefact peak at around 2.8 nm. Interestingly, it was found that isotherm data associated with TSE can be used to calculate the total pore volume of all large cavities in which cavitation occurs.

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Acknowledgments

This study was financially supported by the Hainan Provincial Natural Science Foundation of China (2018CXTD332 and HD-SYSZX-201802), Science and Technology Development Special Fund Project (ZY2018HN09-3 and ZY2019HN09), National Natural Science Foundation of China (Nos. 51362009 and 21603048).

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  1. State Key Laboratory of Marine Resource Utilization in South China Sea, Hainan Provincial Key Laboratory of Research On Utilization of Si-Zr-Ti Resources, College of Materials Science and Engineering, Hainan University, 58 Renmin Road, Haikou, 570228, China

    Wende Lai, Shuo Yang, Yanghui Jiang, Fangyuan Zhao, Zhengjiong Li, Bilal Zaman, Muhammad Fayaz, Xiran Li & Yong Chen

  2. Key Laboratory of Advanced Energy Materials Chemistry (Ministry of Education), Nankai University, Tianjin, 300071, China

    Yong Chen

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  1. Wende Lai
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Lai, W., Yang, S., Jiang, Y. et al. Artefact peaks of pore size distributions caused by unclosed sorption isotherm and tensile strength effect. Adsorption 26, 633–644 (2020). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10450-020-00228-1

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