Synthesis of Artificial Opals with Uniform Mesoporous Silica Spheres

The mesoporous silica submicron-spheres (80–200 nm) with a small dispersion in diameter (< 10%) as the building blocks of the artificial mesoporous silica opals have been synthesized using quaternary ammonium surfactant as template in an aqueous solution of suitable polarity at near neutral condition of pH = 7.0–9.0.