Mesoporous silica nanoparticles for high capacity adsorptive desulfurization

Abstract

Desulfurized JP-8 fuel is of great interest for use as the hydrogen feedstock of fuel cells. The refractory aromatic sulfur species present, however, are particularly challenging to remove through traditional methods. We report the first use of mesoporous silica nanoparticles (MSN) for desulfurization and the material displays a four-fold greater performance towards JP-8 fuel over previous sorbents. The bulk form of mesoporous silica shows three-fold greater level of desulfurization. Silver-impregnated nanoparticle and bulk MCM-41 were found to have saturation adsorption capacities of 32.6 mgS g⁻¹ and 25.4 mgS g⁻¹, respectively. MSN display a high capacity for the notoriously difficult to remove 4,6-dimethyldibenzothiophene along with a two-fold improvement in breakthrough capacity over previously published materials, of 0.98 mgS g⁻¹ at 10 ppm_wS.