Oriented inorganic films

Since 1996 there have been over 500 literature citations for oriented inorganic films, although a majority of these papers are concerned with vapor phase processing routes such as chemical vapor deposition. Within the context of colloid and interface science there has been continued, incremental progress in so-called ‘sol-gel’ or ‘solution chemical’ processing of epitaxial ferroelectric and piezoelectric films for a variety of electronic and optical applications. A promising new approach that obviates the requirement of a single crystal substrate involves heterogenous nucleation and growth on preorganized organic and organically-modified surfaces. Such biomimetic schemes have also been used to form highly oriented porous films for use in separations, sensors, and catalysis. New hydrothermal routes have been devised to prepare oriented zeolite films as well as ferroelectric films. It is anticipated that the combination of self-assembly processes with innovative patterning strategies should lead to future advances in this field.