Preparation of ultrastable mesoporous silica using a phenanthroline-appended cholesterol organogelator as a template

New phenanthroline-appended cholesterol organic gelator 1 was synthesized. It was shown from the gelation test that it acts as a versatile gelator of organic fluids such as DMSO, DMF, 1-propanol, acetic acid, etc. The sol-gel polymerization of tetraethoxysilane (TEOS) was carried out using the 1 + acetic acid gel. The silica obtained from the I + acetic acid gel resulted in a tubular structure with ca. 4.5 nm inner diameter, which showed the 7.08 value for Q(4)/Q(3). These results indicate that the ultrastable mesoporous-sized silica structure can be created by transcription of the organogel superstructure as a template.