The Polymer Society of Korea

Abstract

The soft-template method is a powerful strategy for synthesizing mesoporous metal oxides (MMOs), offering high versatility that enables access to a wide range of compositions and nanostructures. Nevertheless, conventional approaches face fundamental limitations. First, solvent-evaporation–driven block copolymer self-assembly inevitably requires toxic solvents, and achieving homogeneous integration of  nanomaterials into MMOs is challenging, often resulting in phase segregation and structural inhomogeneity. These issues suppress the potential synergistic interactions between nanomaterials and the mesostructure. Second, high-temperature calcination is typically needed for template removal and oxide conversion, which restricts direct synthesis on plastic substrates and limits applicability to flexible devices. To overcome these two challenges, we introduce condensation-induced self-assembly (CISA) and a synergistic effect of thermal activation and plasma.