(224e) History of Aerosol Manufacture of Materials

The historic development of commercially available, aerosol-made particles is reviewed. Emphasis is placed on flame-made carbon black, TiO₂ and SiO₂ that dominate the aerosol-made material market by volume and value followed by particles made in hot-wall reactors (ZnO, Ni, WC). Despite the initial empiricism associated in creating such technologies, today there is good understanding of the controlling mechanisms based firmly on aerosol science and engineering that focuses on the high temperature residence time of these particles. In fact, this understanding guides the rational design and construction on new units of the above commodities outside their traditional base in N. America and Europe. Furthermore and, most importantly, it propels aerosol technology as an enabling one to develop new processes and products for catalysts, sensors, biomaterials, electroceramics, photonics and others. On the other hand, economic manufacturing of such materials brings new challenges to aerosol science as, for example, with the dynamics of fractal-like aerosols flowing at high concentrations (1), health effects and the synthesis of multicomponent, layered particles (2).

1. M.C. Heine, S.E. Pratsinis, "Agglomerate TiO₂ Aerosol Dynamics at High Concentration", Part. Part. Syst. Charact. 24, 56-65 (2007).

2. R. Strobel, S.E. Pratsinis, ?Flame aerosol synthesis of smart nanostructured materials?, J. Mater. Chem., 17, 4743 - 4756 (2007).