sequitur | Horst Hintze-Bruening

The aim of my PhD thesis was to unravel the molecular mechanisms of thermal hydrogen transfer reactions. It provided evidence for a previously disputed reaction mechanism and scrutinized a novel catalytic transfer on colloidal nickel (1984 - 1987).

The picture shows different selectively deuterated variants of 1,4-cycloheaxadiene along with the totally deuterated version which were used for the measurement of kinetic isotope effects and for the analysis of H/D patterns in reaction products.

My industrial research activities dealt with coatings resin design, novel adhesion systems for untreated polyolefin substrates, sol-gel derived scratch resistant coatings and the design of coatings and processes for the roll-to-roll manufacturing of multilayered films for automotive applications (1987 - 2003).

The picture shows a pilot plant in operation. A metallic base coat (dark grey) is slit casted on a thermoplastic carrier foil (beige) as shown in the inserts. The main image shows a flash-off channel (windows) followed by a convection oven.

Since 2003 my coatings materials research focusses on hybrids and nano composites with the emphasis on colloidal aspects, in particular molecular self-assembly in aqueous phase and lyotropic liquid crystal phases of anisotropic nanoparticles and bola-amphiphiles.

The picture shows a section of a methyl imogolite nanotube which apparently resembles a rolled kaolinite. However, contrary to the layered clay, the outer gibbsite layer is decorated with isolated silica tetrahedra on top of the lacunae and linked to three aluminum sites. Their apical Si-OH group (in natural imogolite) is actually a Si-CH₃ group from the precursor methyl trialkoxy silane.

Our trials to synthesize ethyl imogolite (and higher homologues) failed (unpublished work) and to the best of the author's knowledge ethyl imogolite hasn't been reported yet, in contrast to aminomethyl imogolite.