5. Soil-gel applications

There are many applications for sol-gel materials, and we'll confine ourselves here to the main examples. As sol-gel chemistry is a "soft" method of glass production, the main application is for the production of thin glass layers of various compositions [29][43] . In conventional glass synthesis, the precursors have to be melted, and in order to achieve good homogeneity of the mixtures, temperatures of up to 1,400 ˚C are frequently required. With the sol-gel process, due to the fact that mixing is already achieved on a molecular scale, temperatures in the range of 600 to 900 ˚C are sufficient, thus saving energy. In addition, uniform deposits can be achieved without melting. High-index glasses can thus be prepared from mixtures of silicon alkoxides and titanium or zirconium...