Study of the surface properties of ceramic materials by chromatography. Final performance report

Most fundamental research on adsorption assumes adsorbent surfaces to be homogeneous. Material chemists have been able to design and prepare a variety of adsorbents with a highly homogeneous surface. These adsorbents are widely used in chromatography and in adsorption studies, contributing to further anchor the idea that homogeneous surfaces are the most frequent case. In reality, many common materials used as finely divided powders such as pigments, fillers, ceramics, or involved in industrial procedures such as adhesion, have inhomogeneous surfaces, and this fact explains difficulties and troubles in predicting their properties and usefulness. The main result of work is a practical method which permits the detailed study of the chemical properties of non-homogeneous surfaces.