Highly flexible spicules of marine glass sponge Rossella fibulata

Kuvaus:

Description: English: Highly flexible spicules of marine glass sponge Rossella fibulata (a). Pieces of clean spicules were placed in deionized water and disrupted using magnet stirrer. Visual observations show that the water solution became of a milky color typical for colloidal suspensions of silica (b). Silica nanoparticles are associated around oriented organic matrix of nanofibrillar nature (c). Transparent hard glassy spheres were obtained using this fraction of colloidal suspension after dropping into 99% TMOS solution at room temperature (d). Date: 9 March 2008. Source: Own work. Author: Florentyna.