Fabrication of monodisperse silica spheres using statistical design of experiments

Abstract

The statistical design of experiments was succesfully carried out in order to synthesize monodisperse silica spheres using a fractional factorial design with a resolution of V. In this design, the input variables were the temperature, the concentration of NI-I-3, the concentration of TEOS, the methanol/n-prophyl alcohol ratio, and the distilled water. The output variables were the particle size, standard deviations, and the degree of agglomeration. Simulataneous consideration of the particle characteristics allowed for all optimum regime in the experimental conditions in addition to all understanding of the experimental variables. The concentrations of TEOS and distilled water are determined to be statistically significant variables for the controlling of the particle sizes. The size of the monodisperse silica Spheres was found to be approximately 400 nm.