Thermal properties of methyltrimethoxysilane aerogel thin films

Aerogels are light and porous solids whose properties, largely determined by their nanostructure, are useful in a wide range of applications, e.g., thermal insulation. In this work, as-deposited and thermally treated air-filled silica aerogel thin films synthesized using the sol-gel method were stud...

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Bibliographic Details
Main Authors: Leandro N. Acquaroli, Pascal Newby, Clara Santato, Yves-Alain Peter
Format: Article
Language:English
Published: AIP Publishing LLC 2016-10-01
Series:AIP Advances
Online Access:http://dx.doi.org/10.1063/1.4965921
Description
Summary:Aerogels are light and porous solids whose properties, largely determined by their nanostructure, are useful in a wide range of applications, e.g., thermal insulation. In this work, as-deposited and thermally treated air-filled silica aerogel thin films synthesized using the sol-gel method were studied for their thermal properties using the 3-omega technique, at ambient conditions. The thermal conductivity and diffusivity were found to increase as the porosity of the aerogel decreased. Thermally treated films show a clear reduction in thermal conductivity compared with that of as-deposited films, likely due to an increase of porosity. The smallest thermal conductivity and diffusivity found for our aerogels were 0.019 W m−1 K−1 and 9.8 × 10-9 m2 s−1. A model was used to identify the components (solid, gaseous and radiative) of the total thermal conductivity of the aerogel.
ISSN:2158-3226