The Effect of Heat Treatment of Silica Gels on the Calorimetric Heats of Adsorption of Sulfur Dioxide up to One-twentieth Monolayer Coverage at 423 °K

Abstract

Calorimetric heats of adsorption of sulfur dioxide have been determined at 423°K for a series of silica gels heat-treated at 240, 550, 700, 800, and 900 °C. At the lowest surface coverage of 0.01 μmol m−2, heats of 25 to 30 kcal mol−1 were observed. These values dropped rapidly with increasing coverage and approached "limiting" values of 6 to 7 and 12 kcal mol−1 for dehydroxylated and hydroxylated surfaces, respectively. To explain the results at lowest coverages an adsorbed complex involving multiple hydrogen bonds is proposed while at higher coverages it is suggested that single and dual site adsorbed species predominate for the dehydroxylated and hydroxylated surfaces, respectively. Sulfur dioxide adsorption isotherms on all gels at 423 °K obeyed the Langmuir equation.Adsorbents were characterized by nitrogen adsorption–desorption isotherms at 77 °K and pore size distribution data were calculated from the desorption branch.