Synthesis of Heterometallic Zirconium Alkoxide Single-Source Precursors for Bimetallic Oxide Deposition

Abstract

Single-source precursors are ubiquitous in a number of areas of chemistry and material science due to their ease of use and wide range of potential applications. The development of new single-source precursors is essential in providing entries to new areas of chemistry. In this work, we synthesize nine new structurally related bimetallic metal-zirconium alkoxides, which can be used as single-source precursors to zirconia-based materials. Detailed analysis of the structures of these complexes provides important insights into the main factors influencing their aggregation. Investigation of the thermal decomposition of these species by TGA, PXRD, SEM, and EDS reveals that they can be used to produce bimetal oxides, such as Li2ZrO3, or a mixture of metal oxides, such as CuO and ZrO2. Significantly, these studies show that thermodynamically unstable forms of zirconia, such as the tetragonal phase, can be stabilized by metal doping, providing the promise for targeted deposition of zirconia materials for specific applications.

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“…SSPs have been reported for a variety of metal oxide thin films, often using alkoxide-based ligands to ensure low decomposition temperature and high compositional purity. 205,270–275 BaTiO 3 , BaZrO 3 , and BaTi 0.5 Zr 0.5 O 3 were developed by Veith et al via a sol–gel technique using [BaM(OH)(O i Pr) 5 (HO i Pr) 3 ] 2 (M = Ti, Zr) and [BaTi 0.5 Zr 0.5 (O i Pr) 6 ] 2 SSPs. 245 BaTiO 3 thin films were reported to be pure state at 600 °C using these precursors, whereas the equivalent films using dual-source precursors still contained many impurities at 1200 °C including BaCO 3 and Ba 2 TiO 4 .…”

“…SSPs have been reported for a variety of metal oxide thin films, often using alkoxidebased ligands to ensure low decomposition temperature and high compositional purity. 205,[270][271][272][273][274][275] SSPs. 245 BaTiO 3 thin films were reported to be pure state at 600 1C using these precursors, whereas the equivalent films using dual-source precursors still contained many impurities at 1200 1C including BaCO 3 and Ba 2 TiO 4 .…”