Hydraulic radius and mesh size of gels

George W. Scherer

Research output: Contribution to journalArticlepeer-review

67 Scopus citations

Abstract

For materials with high porosity, the hydraulic radius (rh) is not proportional to the characteristic dimension of the pore space. Techniques (e.g., NMR) that measure rhwill give much larger "pore sizes" than techniques (e.g., thermoporometry) that measure pore entry radii. In this note, estimates of the relation between hydraulic radius and pore size of gel networks are obtained from cell models. The "constant" in the Kozeny equation, which relates permeability to rh, is strongly density-dependent at low densities. For gels it is suggested that the permeability is more directly related to the mesh size of the network than to the hydraulic radius. The mesh size is also critical for immobilization of dyes or enzymes in a gel, and rhis a misleading measure of the ability of a network to entrap a large molecule.

Original languageEnglish (US)
Pages (from-to)285-291
Number of pages7
JournalJournal of Sol-Gel Science and Technology
Volume1
Issue number3
DOIs
StatePublished - Jan 1994

All Science Journal Classification (ASJC) codes

  • Electronic, Optical and Magnetic Materials
  • Ceramics and Composites
  • General Chemistry
  • Biomaterials
  • Condensed Matter Physics
  • Materials Chemistry

Keywords

  • hydraulic radius
  • network
  • permeability
  • pore size

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