Fabrication of ultraviolet and near-infrared reflector using titania/silica multilayers by sol-gel spin coating.

One consequence of the sun's ultraviolet and near-infrared radiation that reaches Earth's surface is macular degeneration, while another is tans. Because of this, it was necessary to treat the windows and glass furniture with a reflecting material. However, coatings are both expensive and time-consuming to make when intricate procedures are used. Therefore, there is a critical need for a single, low-cost reflection coating capable of reflecting both wavelengths. The sol-gel spin coating technology reduces processing time and related production costs due to its user-friendliness. A seven-layer dielectric reflector that can reflect both ultraviolet and near-infrared light is described in this paper. An XRD study of the manufactured reflector showed that anatase-phase TiO2 was present. Verified using Fourier transform infrared spectroscopy (FTIR) are the functional connections between TiO2 and SiO2. The presence of periodic layers of TiO2 and SiO2, in addition to bright and dark layers, was shown by a cross-sectional FESEM examination. Studying the reflectance of the multilayer structure also revealed that it reflected all near-infrared light and 87% of ultraviolet light. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]