Nanostructural Organization of Naturally Occurring Composites—Part II: Silica-Chitin-Based Biocomposites
Figure 1
Highly
flexible spicules of marine glass sponge Rossella
fibulata (a). Pieces of clean spicules were placed in deionized water and
disrupted using magnet stirrer. Visual observations show that the water
solution became of a milky color typical for colloidal suspensions of silica (b).
Silica nanoparticles are associated around oriented organic matrix of
nanofibrillar nature (c). Transparent hard glassy spheres were obtained using
this fraction of colloidal suspension after dropping into 99% TMOS solution at
room temperature (d).
