Enhanced Luminous Transmission and Solar Modulation in Thermochromic VO2Aerogel-like Films via Remote Plasma Deposition

Vanadium dioxide (VO2) is a thermochromic material that undergoes a phase transition from a monoclinic semiconducting state to a rutile metallic state at 68 °C, a temperature close to room temperature. This property makes VO2 particularly valuable in applications such as optical and electrical switc...

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Detalles Bibliográficos
Autores: Obrero, José Manuel, Moreno Martínez, Gloria P., Rojas Ruiz, Teresa Cristina, Ferrer Fernández, Francisco Javier, Moscoso, Francisco G., Contreras-Bernal, Lidia, Castillo Seoane, Javier, Núñez Gálvez, Fernando, Aparicio Rebollo, Francisco Javier, Borrás Martos, Ana Isabel, Sánchez Valencia, Juan Ramón, Barranco Quero, Ángel
Tipo de recurso: artículo
Estado:Versión publicada
Fecha de publicación:2025
País:España
Institución:Universidad de Sevilla (US)
Repositorio:idUS. Depósito de Investigación de la Universidad de Sevilla
OAI Identifier:oai:idus.us.es:11441/181427
Acceso en línea:https://hdl.handle.net/11441/181427
https://doi.org/10.1021/acsami.5c07264
Access Level:acceso abierto
Palabra clave:Aerogel-like films
VO2
Thermochromic
Remote plasma synthesis
Smart windows
Optical films
Descripción
Sumario:Vanadium dioxide (VO2) is a thermochromic material that undergoes a phase transition from a monoclinic semiconducting state to a rutile metallic state at 68 °C, a temperature close to room temperature. This property makes VO2 particularly valuable in applications such as optical and electrical switches, data storage, neuromorphic computing, and remarkably dynamic smart windows for solar radiation control. VO2 typically needs to be synthesized for these applications as nanostructured thin films. Over the past few decades, significant efforts have been made to control the thermochromic properties of VO2 through crystal structure tuning, doping, and the development of VO2 nanocomposites. Additionally, introducing nano- and mesoporosity has been shown to enhance the optical properties of thermochromic VO2 films. This study presents a methodology for producing highly porous, aerogel-like V2O5 films, which can be thermally processed to form aerogel-like VO2 films. This process is based on sequential plasma polymerization and plasma etching to produce aerogel-like V2O5 films that are annealed to yield ultraporous nanocrystalline VO2 films. The sacrificial vanadium-containing plasma polymers are obtained by remote plasma-assisted vacuum deposition (RPAVD) using vanadyl porphyrin as a precursor and Ar as plasma gas. Additional reference compact films VO2 films are obtained by a direct RPAVD process using the same precursor and oxygen plasmas in combination with thermal annealing. The aerogel-like VO2 films show exceptional thermochromic performance with luminous transmittances higher than 54%, solar modulation up to 18.8%, and IR modulation up to 35.5%. The presented plasma methodology is versatile, allowing both the synthesis of VO2 plasmonic structures to enhance the thermochromic response and the encapsulation of films to improve their stability in air dramatically. Additionally, this solvent-free synthetic method is fully compatible with doping procedures, scalable, and holds great potential for designing and optimizing smart window coatings.