Elaboration at 80 degrees C of SiO2 layers deposited by aerosol-gel process

The aerosol-gel process is a thin film deposition technique based on the so l-gel polymerization of a liquid film deposited from an ultrasonically spra yed aerosol. SiO2 layers have been deposited by aerosol-gel process from TE OS solutions prepared using a two-step procedure. After a post-treatment at 80 degrees C, the layers have a remarkable abrasion resistance and a high refractive index. In this paper, the chemical mechanisms involved in the fo rmation of SiO2 layers at low temperature are studied by FTIR spectroscopy and related to the processing conditions.