Synthesis and characterization of MCM-41 powder and its deposition by spin-coating

Abstract This work reports the synthesis of MCM-41 powder via sol-gel and hydrothermal methods, which allows to obtain for the first time, thin films through spin-coating technique with good homogeneity on the silicon substrate, without making the deposition of the sol on a substrate, as well as the calcination to obtain the mesoporous film. Commercial MCM-41 was also added to this work for comparison purposes. Both synthesized and commercial MCM-41 powders were fully characterized by powder X-ray diffraction (XRD), scanning electron microscopy (SEM), transmission electron microscopy (TEM), Fourier transform infrared spectroscopy (FTIR) and nitrogen adsorption-desorption analysis. XRD diffraction results have shown the main peaks planes (100, 110, 200) of the synthesized MCM-41. This material presents a define geometry morphology, a surface area of approximately 981 m 2 /g, and pore size distribution in the range of 30 Ǻ, whereas TEM results show hexagonal ordered pore arrangement. Next, both MCM-41 powders were used to deposit thin films by spin-coating, which were characterized by SEM, XRD, EDX spectrum, and elemental map analysis. The XRD diffraction result shows that the (100) plane corresponds to MCM-41. According to SEM characterizations, MCM-41 thin films are homogeneous. This easy and cheap methodology for the preparation of MCM-41 thin films could be used to develop different kinds of electronic devices such as optical devices, photocatalysis solar cells, electrochromic, photochromic, photonics, sensors, biosensors, among many others.