Supercritical drying of fragile structures

a crucial step in manufacturing aerogels is the drying process. It is of utmost importance not to destroy the fragile micropores of the gel network due to excessive capillary forces that appear in conventional drying processes. Current developments tackle the challenge to improve the economical feasibility of the supercritical drying process that takes place at elevated pressures and to enable manufacturing of various geometries required by specific applications.