Dobosz Alexandra, Daeneke Torben, Zavabeti Ali, Zhang Bao Yue, Orrell-Trigg Rebecca, Kalantar-Zadeh Kourosh, Wójcik Anna, Maziarz Wojciech, Gancarz Tomasz
Institute of Metallurgy and Materials Science, Polish Academy of Sciences, Krakow 30-059, Poland.
School of Engineering, RMIT University, Melbourne, Victoria 3001, Australia.
Nanomaterials (Basel). 2019 Feb 9;9(2):235. doi: 10.3390/nano9020235.
Ga⁻Sn⁻Zn eutectic alloy is a non-toxic liquid metal alloy which could be used in a multitude of applications, including as a heat transfer agent, in gas sensing, and in medicine. Alloys containing gallium readily oxidise in air, forming a thin oxide layer that influences the properties of liquid metals and which has not been studied. In this study, the oxide layer formed on Ga⁻Sn⁻Zn alloy was transferred at room temperature onto three substrates-quartz, glass and silicon. The contact angle between the liquid alloy and different substrates was determined. The obtained thin oxide films were characterised using atomic force microscopy, X-ray photon spectroscopy, and optical and transmission electron microscopy. The contact angle does not influence the deposition of the layers. It was determined that it is possible to obtain nanometric oxide layers of a few micrometres in size. The chemical composition was determined by XPS and EDS independently, and showed that the oxide layer contains about 90 atom % of gallium with some additions of tin and zinc. The oxides obtained from the eutectic Ga⁻Sn⁻Zn liquid alloys appear to be nanocrystalline.
镓-锡-锌共晶合金是一种无毒液态金属合金，可用于多种应用，包括作为传热介质、用于气体传感以及医学领域。含镓合金在空气中容易氧化，形成一层薄氧化层，这层氧化层会影响液态金属的性能，且尚未得到研究。在本研究中，在室温下将形成于镓-锡-锌合金上的氧化层转移到三种基底上——石英、玻璃和硅。测定了液态合金与不同基底之间的接触角。使用原子力显微镜、X射线光电子能谱以及光学和透射电子显微镜对所得的薄氧化膜进行了表征。接触角不影响层的沉积。已确定有可能获得尺寸为几微米的纳米级氧化层。通过XPS和EDS分别测定了化学成分，结果表明氧化层含有约90原子%的镓，并添加了一些锡和锌。从镓-锡-锌共晶液态合金获得的氧化物似乎是纳米晶的。
