Highly compressible and anisotropic lamellar ceramic sponges with superior thermal insulation and acoustic absorption performances

Advanced ceramic sponge materials with temperature-invariant high compressibility are urgently needed as thermal insulators, energy absorbers, catalyst carriers, and high temperature air filters. However, the application of ceramic sponge materials is severely limited due to their complex preparation process. Here, we present a facile method for large-scale fabrication of highly compressible, temperature resistant SiO2-Al2O3 composite ceramic sponges by blow spinning and subsequent calcination. We successfully produce anisotropic lamellar ceramic sponges with numerous stacked microfiber layers and density as low as 10mgcm(-3). The anisotropic lamellar ceramic sponges exhibit high compression fatigue resistance, strain-independent zero Poisson's ratio, robust fire resistance, temperature-invariant compression resilience from -196 to 1000 degrees C, and excellent thermal insulation with a thermal conductivity as low as 0.034Wm(-1) K-1. In addition, the lamellar structure also endows the ceramic sponges with excellent sound absorption properties, representing a promising alternative to existing thermal insulation and acoustic absorption materials. Temperature-invariant highly compressible ceramic sponges are attractive for thermal insulators and energy absorbers, but development is limited by complex preparation processes. Here the authors report large-scale fabrication of silica-alumina composite ceramic sponges via blow spinning and calcination.