ABSTRACT
An FTIR experiment especially designed to study the growth of an organosilane layer at the interface between a solution and a flat silica surface is presented. High sensitivity is achieved by using the attenuated total reflection (ATR) technique in a liquid flow cell. The ATR crystal, either silicon or germanium, is covered with a very thin silica layer. Chemical reactions of a mono- and a di-hydrolyzable silane with the silica substrate have been investigated. The grafting of a submonolayer of the first reagent has been monitored by following the C—H and SiO—H vibrations. The density of grafted molecules has been estimated and information on the nature of the chemical bonding has been achieved. Evidence for the chain-polymerization of the dihydrolyzable silane at the substrate/solution interface has been inferred from the appearance of a Si—O—Si absorption band.
