Introduction

Abstract

In the past decade, hybrid and hierarchical composites have come into focus for their ability to be property-specific solutions to design problems that cannot be solved by homogeneous materials. Significant advances have been especially made in the more established areas of organic-inorganic hybrids, and bioinspired and biomimetic hierarchical composites have led the development in the hierarchical composite research areas. Because of this, numerous review articles and books have been written on each of these topics (Buehler et al., Eur J Inorg Chem 2012(32):5091-5420, 2012; Sanchez et al., Chem Soc Rev 40(2):453-1152, 2011; Studart, Adv Mater 24(37):5024-5044, 2012; Chen and Pugno, J Mech Behav Biomed Mater 19:3-33, 2013; Fratzl and Weinkamer, Prog Mater Sci 52(8):1263- 1334, 2007; Qian et al., J Mater Chem 20(23):4751, 2010; Kickelbick, Hybrid materials: synethesis, characterization, and applications, Wiley-VCH Verlag, Weinheim, 2007; Gomez-Romero and Sanchez, Functional Hybrid Materials, Wiley-VCH Verlag, Weinheim, 2004; Su et al., Hierarchically structured porous materials: from nanoscience to catalysis, separation, optics, energy, and life science, Wiley-VCH Verlag, Weinheim, 2011; Zhang and Wei, Advanced hierarchical nanostructured materials, Wiley-VCH Verlag, Weinheim, 2014) with some focused on specific material class or application. However, few have focused on the nanoscale contributions and linkages of these composites. The goal of this book is to cover a broad range of current nano-lengthscale hybrid and hierarchical composite research, including the processing, properties, modeling, and applications of these composites, for a technical audience interested in learning more about these subject areas.