Silicon Dioxide Coating Deposited by PDPs on PET Films and Influence on Oxygen Transmission Rate

A silicon dioxide film is deposited on the polyethyleneterephtalate (PET) by a penning discharge plasma source at ambient temperature in a high vacuum chamber. Hexamethyldisiloxane and oxygen are adopted as precursor and reactive reagent to grow a nano-scale silicon dioxide layer on polymer surfaces. For the chemical structure analysis x-ray photoelectron spectroscopy is performed to demonstrate the content of Si, O and C elements. It is noticed that a higher silicon concentration is contained if Ar plasma is used for pretreatment. X-ray diffraction analysis shows that a micro-crystal silicon dioxide is formed by peak patterns at 25.84° and 21.8°. The barrier properties examined by oxygen transmission rate show that the permeation parameter of the 12-μm-thick PET film drastically decreases from 135cc/m2 per day for the control one to 0.713cc/m2 per day for the as-deposited one after Ar plasma treatment. The surface morphology related to the barrier properties of SiOx-coated polymers os also investigated by scanning electron microscopy and atomic force microscopy.