Determination of specific surfaces of silica xerogets by SAXS

Small angle X-ray scattering (SAXS) with synchrotron radiation as X-ray source has been used to study the structure of silica xerogets prepared by sol-get process. Both the agreement of SAXS profiles with and the deviation from Porod’s law and Debye’s theory have been found, showing that there are differences between the structures of these xerogets. The specific surfaces of the samples whose SAXS profiles agreed with Porod’s law and Debye’s theory have been determined by analyzing SAXS data according to the methods of Porod and Debye, respectivety, and the results of both methods used were found to be similar. We have proposed the corresponding Porod and Debye analysis methods to determine the specific surfaces of samples whose SAXS profiles do not agree with Porod’s law and Debye’s theory, i.e. the negative or positive deviation. The results of both methods used here were also found to be close to each other. The specific surfaces fell between approximatety 80–150 m2/cm3 for the samples prepared under various conditions.