Surface area, crystal morphology and characterization of transition alumina powders from a new gibbsite precursor

Abstract

A new procedure was used to prepare a microcrystalline powder constituted by thin euhedral hexagonal gibbsite plates, 0.2 to 0.6 μm in diameter and 32 nm thick. The powder, fired between 200 and 1000 °C, produced chi and kappa transition aluminas. Alpha-alumina is formed from 1000 °C and recrystallized up to 1500 °C. At 1000 °C, kappa- and alpha-alumina coexisted, but kappa-alumina could only be characterized by SAED. The details of the internal organization of the transition alumina pseudomorphs were clearly observable in TEM due to the great thinness of the I-gibbsite plates. The specific surface area varied from pristine I-gibbsite (24.9 m2.g-1) to chi- and kappa transition aluminas (25.4 m2.g-1) at 1000 °C to alpha-alumina (4.0 m2.g-1) at 1500 °C. The maximum value of specific surface area is 347 m2.g-1 in chi-alumina powder at 300 °C, a difference from Bayer gibbsite, in which the chi-alumina highest surface area is 370 m2.g-1 at 400 °C.