Synthesis and Study of Organic Nanostructures Fabricated by Inclusion of 2-Methylbenzimidazole Molecules in Nanotubes of Chrysotile Asbestos, Mesoporous Silica, and Nanopores of Borate Glasses

Abstract

New organic nanostructures were synthesized by introducing 2-methylbenzimidazole (MBI) molecules from a melt, gas phase, or alcoholic solution into nanosized voids of borate porous glasses (PG), nanotubes of chrysotile asbestos (ChA), and mesoporous silica (MS). The incorporation of MBI into borate glasses with different pore sizes is accompanied by the appearance of several phases formed by nanocrystallites which have a MBI crystal structure, but somewhat differ in lattice parameters. The size of some crystallites significantly exceeds the size of nanopores, which indicates the presence of long-scale correlations of the crystal structure. The size of MBI nanocrystallites in ChA was close to the diameter of nanotubes (D ~10 nm), which shows the absence of crystal structure correlations. The XRD pattern of mesoporous silica filled by MBI does not exhibit reflections caused by MBI and a presence of MBI was confirmed only by the analysis of correlation function. The incorporation of MBI molecules into matrices is observed through optical IR absorption spectroscopy (FTIR) and photoluminescence. Introducing MBI in ChA and MS is followed by the appearance of bright green photoluminescence, the spectral structure of which is analogous to MBI crystals but slightly shifted in the blue region, probably due to a quantum-size effect. The influence of MBI inclusion in PG and ChA on the permittivity, dielectric losses, conductivity, and parameters of their hopping conductivity is analyzed.