n e w s o f t h e w e e k

Changing of the guard at DuPont Last week, DuPont's board of directors put in place a series of sweeping chang­es intended to provide new leadership at the company.

Effective immediately, Charles O. Hol-liday Jr., 49, has succeeded John (Jack) A. Krol, 61, as president of DuPont. Krol immediately assumed the duties of chair­man of the board, and will retain the po­sition of chief executive officer until Feb. 1, 1998. Former board chairman Edgar S.

Krol (left) describes the transition to Holllday as

Woolard Jr., 63, relinquished that title last week, but remains a member of the board.

Holliday, most recently executive vice president and chairman of DuPont Asia-Pacific, will assume the CEO's mantle in addition to the president's title when Krol gives up the CEO position in Febru­ary. Krol will leave the chairman's post on Dec. 31, 1998, at which time Holliday will also become chairman.

Krol describes the transition as "a pos­itive step toward ensuring strong lead­

ership in the 21st century and DuPont's third century." DuPont was founded as a manufacturer of gunpowder in 1802. Says Woolard, "Jack is putting in place an orderly transition that will result in generational change and leadership for DuPont."

Though Krol has been president and CEO for only two years, he says the transl· tions are not as sudden as they may appear. The "board's action is consistent with the timetable [based on family considerations] I set for myself when I became CEO." And he says he has achieved the goals he had set for himself delivering short-term financial per­

formance, better focusing research and develop­ment, shaping the busi­ness portfolio for long-term profitable growth, and building a team to lead DuPont.

Holliday, who earned a B.S. degree in indus­trial engineering at the University of Tennessee, started out as an engi­neer in DuPont's fibers department in 1970. He

a positive step. h d d a ^ή^ o f Jobs w i t h" in the fibers business;

joined the chemicals and pigments depart­ment as director of the marketing division in 1988; and, starting in 1990, took on assignments in Asia-Pacific in the interna­tional department.

Holliday says, "We will stay on course with the direction that Jack set for the company." And he added, "We will con­tinue to drive for at least 10 to 12% annu­al earnings growth so that we achieve our target of a minimum 15% annual shareholder return."

Marc Reisch

Mesoporous conducting films grown from liquid crystalline mixtures A liquid crystalline electroplating tech­nique developed by chemists in En­gland yields thin metallic films perforat­ed by lattices of small pores. Potential applications include the production of porous electrodes for batteries, fuel cells, electrochemical capacitors, and sensors.

The team at the University of South­ampton, led by senior lecturer George S. Attard, electrodeposited platinum onto a

polished gold electrode from a liquid crystalline plating mixture [Science, 278, 838 (1997)]. "The method we have de­veloped exploits the periodic nanome­ter-scale architectures of the liquid crys­talline phases formed by surfactant mole­cules," Attard tells C&EN.

"This is a major breakthrough," com­ments liquid-crystals expert Richard H. Templer, reader in physical chemistry at Imperial College of Science, Technology & Medicine, London. "I predict that over the next two years you will see an enor­mous efflorescence of papers on materi­als prepared by this technique."

The method is attractive and unique because it produces a continuous thin

film with macroscopic dimensions of a highly ordered mesoporous material that is inherendy electrically conducting, ac­cording to Charles R. Martin, professor of chemistry at Colorado State University, Fort Collins. Usually, mesoporous materi­als—that is, materials with pores ranging in diameter from about 2 to 10 nm-are insulating granular solids like certain zeo­lites, he points out.

The Southampton group uses a liq­uid crystalline phase in which the sur­factant molecules aggregate into cylin­ders of indefinite length. "These cylin­ders are aligned with respect to each other and are disposed on a hexagonal lattice which extends throughout the sample," Attard explains. "The aggregates look a bit like corn on the cob, where the kernels are the polar head groups and the hydrocarbon chains sit on the inside."

The platinum is electrodeposited in between the surfactant aggregates from the surrounding aqueous hexachloropla-tinic acid solution. The surfactant is then removed by using deionized water.

Transmission electron micrographs reveal that the platinum film, which is about 300 nm thick, has a highly porous structure consisting of cylindrical holes previously occupied by the surfactant ag­gregates. The holes, like the aggregates, are arranged on a hexagonal lattice and are about 2.5 nm in diameter.

The diameter of the holes can be var­ied either by changing the hydrocarbon chain length of the surfactant molecules or by adding an alkane such as «-heptane to the plating mixture.

"Nearly all current industrial elec-trodeposition processes can be adapted to use liquid crystalline plating mixtures to produce nanostructured metals, ox­ides, conducting polymers, semiconduc­tors, or electrochromic materials," Attard says. "What makes our nanostructured materials particularly interesting and nov­el is that they combine a regular inter­connected porosity, electronic conduc­tivity, and high surface areas. This means that interfacial processes can occur more readily, at higher densities, and without adverse diffusion effects.

"We are currently working with sev­eral companies to exploit our invention," continues Attard. "Our expectation is that, over the next three years, electrode­posited nanostructured films will provide the basis for new generations of batter­ies, fuel cells, sensors, display devices, solar cells, and smart windows."

Michael Freemantle

8 NOVEMBER 3, 1997 C&EN