Highly nanoporous silicas with pore apertures near the boundary between micro- and mesopores through an orthogonal self-assembly approach.

Nanoporous silicas having some periodicity, high surface area (up to 1230 m(2) g(-1)), and pore diameters near the boundary between micro- and mesopores are synthesized using aromatic compounds bearing anionic end-groups as novel structure-directing agents (SDAs) that can facilitate multiple interactions between SDAs, co-SDAs and silica frameworks orthogonally.