Elsevier, Solar Energy Materials and Solar Cells, 7(95), p. 1694-1700
DOI: 10.1016/j.solmat.2011.01.032
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Sol-gel SiO2 anti-reflection (AR) coating on solar glass is known to increase the current output by a few percent, but its mechanical durability is of concern. To improve its strength, the amorphous SiO2 may be replaced by zeolite, which is a microporous aluminosilicate crystalline material. Scratch-resistant AR coating has been prepared by the dip coating of a composition which contains aggregated zeolite nanoparticles as the structure provider and zeolite precursors as the reactive binder. AR coating with better than 5H pencil hardness can be made with a composition containing BEA zeolite. Nanoindenter measurements show that this BEA zeolite films have 1.5GPa indent hardness and 35GPa elastic modulus. Furthermore, the freshly prepared AR coating shows a self-cleaning effect with a water contact angle (WCA) close to zero. It can be made super-hydrophobic with larger than 130 WCA after modifying with hexamethyl-disilazane (HMDS), upon which the pencil hardness further increases to 6H