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The molecular composition of non-modified and acac-modified propoxide and butoxide precursors of zirconium and hafnium dioxides

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Abstract

Long-term storage at 0 °C of a paraffin-sealed flask with commercial 70 wt% solution of zirconium n-propoxide in n-propanol resulted in crystallization of an individual oxoalkoxide complex Zr4O(OnPr)14(nPrOH)2 in over 20% yield. The structure of this molecule can be described as a triangular Zr3(μ3-O)(OR)10(ROH) core of 3 edge-sharing octahedrons with an additional Zr(OR)4(ROH) unit attached through a pair of (μ-OR) bridges. Mass spectrometric and 1H NMR investigation of the commercial samples of the most broadly applied zirconium and hafnium n-propoxides and n-butoxides indicate the presence of analogous species in the commercial alkoxide precursors. The content of oxo-alkoxide species in the commercial precursors has been estimated to be ~20% for n-propoxide and ~35% for zirconium n-butoxide. A new route has been presented for synthesis of the individual crystalline mixed ligand precursor [Zr(OnPr)(OiPr)3(iPrOH)]2, from zirconium n-propoxide. A high yield has been observed (~90%), indicative of an almost complete precursor transformation. Mass spectrometry has shown that the synthesized mixed ligand precursor is dimeric, which makes it an attractive alternative to zirconium n-propoxide. Addition of 1 eq of Acetylacetone to zirconium or hafnium alkoxide precursors results in formation of dimeric [M(OR)3(acac)]2 in high yields. These species have limited stability (much higher for Hf than for Zr) and transform in solution into hydrolysis-insensitive M(acac)4 through very unstable M(acac)3(OR) intermediates containing 7-coordinated metal centers. This transformation can be followed kinetically in hydrocarbon solvents by 1H NMR and is noticeably accelerated by addition of parent alcohols. The obtained results clearly reveal limited applicability of EXAFS and XANES techniques for the study of such systems, especially in the context of structure prediction.

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Acknowledgments

The authors are very grateful to Rolf Andersson and Dr. Corine Sandström for the assistance with the NMR analysis and to Suresh Gohil for performing the mass spectrometry experiments. Dr. ir. Nieck E. Benes (University of Eindhoven) is kindly acknowledged for the scientific discussions. We thank the Swedish Research Council (Vetenskapsrådet) and the Dutch Economy-Ecology-Technology (EET) program for support of this research.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Inorganic Materials Science, Faculty of Science & Technology, University of Twente, P.O. Box 217, 7500 AE, Enschede, The Netherlands

    Gerald I. Spijksma, Henny J. M. Bouwmeester & Dave H. A. Blank

  2. MESA+ Institute for Nanotechnology, University of Twente, P.O. Box 217, 7500 AE, Enschede, The Netherlands

    Gerald I. Spijksma, Henny J. M. Bouwmeester & Dave H. A. Blank

  3. Department of Chemistry, SLU, Box 7015, 750 07, Uppsala, Sweden

    Gerald I. Spijksma, Gulaim A. Seisenbaeva & Vadim G. Kessler

  4. Inorganic Chemistry, Royal University of Technology, 100 44, Stockholm, Sweden

    Andreas Fischer

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  1. Gerald I. Spijksma
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  2. Gulaim A. Seisenbaeva
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  3. Andreas Fischer
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  6. Vadim G. Kessler
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Correspondence to Vadim G. Kessler.

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Spijksma, G.I., Seisenbaeva, G.A., Fischer, A. et al. The molecular composition of non-modified and acac-modified propoxide and butoxide precursors of zirconium and hafnium dioxides. J Sol-Gel Sci Technol 51, 10–22 (2009). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10971-009-1988-0

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s10971-009-1988-0

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