Sol-gel processed silica/titania/y-glycidoxypropyltrimethoxysilane composite materials for photonic applications

Silica titania/y-Glycidoxypropyltrimethoxysilane composite materials processed by the sol-gel technique were studied for photonic applications. Waveguide thin films with thickness more than 1.7 μm were prepared by the sol-gel spin coating technique and low temperature heat treatment from this high titanium content composite materials. The films were analyzed by atomic force microscopy (AFM), ellipsometry, differential thermal analysis (DTA), thermal gravimetric analysis (TGA), UV-visible spectroscopy (UV-VIS), and Fourier transform infrared (FT-IR) spectroscopy. It was observed that the film becomes thinner as the titanium contents increase. A change of the refractive index through the range 1.52-1.61 at the optical wavelength of 683 nm was achieved by varying the molar ratio between silica and titanium. A dense, low absorption, and high transparency in the visible range waveguide films could be obtained at a low temperature. It was also noted that organic compounds in the film would decompose in the temperature range from 200 °C to 480 °C. Accordingly, purely inorganic silica-titania films with a thickness of about 0.7 μm could also be obtained by a single-coating process, when the film was baked at a temperature of 500 °C or higher. The waveguides properties and photonic applications of the composite material sol-gel films were also investigated.