Infrared spectroscopy analysis of the local atomic structure in silica prepared by sol-gel

Infrared spectroscopy has been used to analyze the structural changes in samples prepared by the sol-gel method. Silica gels were prepared from alcoholic solutions of tetraethylorthosilicate (TEOS) with different H2O/TEOS molar ratios. The IR spectra of these gels, in the Si–O bond stretching region, shows that their structure strongly depends on the H2O/TEOS ratio. The relative change in intensity of the Si–O stretching modes, in samples prepared using different H2O/TEOS ratios, are interpreted in terms of different degrees of structural disorder. According to our infrared absorption data, a decrease in the H2O/TEOS ratio from about 7, the SiO2 structure evolves from a three-dimensional network toward a chainlike structure.