Seville, June 6, 2014. A team led by researchers from the Institute of Materials Science in Seville has developed a mechanism to manufacture nanoporous coatings by plasma spraying. This novel procedure allows the production of materials with structures ‘made to order’ and with numerous applications.
In industry, nanoporous powder materials are manufactured by chemical synthesis, which requires high temperatures and generates waste that is difficult to recycle. However, in this work, alternative techniques to the chemical method have been explored, using plasmas to manufacture nanoporous coatings in a single step and at room temperature.
Plasma is a very energetic gas that, in the form used in this work, pulverizes a solid block and breaks it down into individual atoms. The researchers have deduced and experimentally tested a mathematical equation that allows them to direct the arrival of atoms to a surface, and control the growth of different nanoporous coatings.
This new procedure represents a significant improvement on the techniques commonly used in the microelectronics industry, with the added advantage of being able to be extended to the manufacture of a large number of materials, with applications in biomedicine or gas and water purification, among others. Following this line, in 2013 this same team of researchers manufactured gold with controlled nanoporosity, a material with environmental applications for the elimination of gases that cause the greenhouse effect.
In this study led by the researcher Alberto Palmero, from the Institute of Materials Science in Seville, other researchers from the Institute of Microelectronics in Madrid, from the National Acceleration Centre in Seville, and from the Department of Atomic, Molecular and Nuclear Physics, from the University of Seville, have participated. Their results have just appeared highlighted on the cover of the magazine Plasma Processes and Polymers this June.
Rafael Álvarez, José M. Garcia-MartÍn, María C. Lopez-Santos, Víctor Rico, Francisco J. Ferrer, Jose Cotrino, Agustín R. González-Elipe and Alberto Palmero. On the Deposition Rates of Magnetron Sputtered Thin Films at Oblique Angles. Plasma Processes and Polymers. Doi: 10.1002/ppap.201300201
