Molecular designing of precursors for chemical vapor deposition

Both tin oxide and antimony oxide, can act as gas sensing material whose activity/selectivity is enhanced by the incorporation of a second metal. We are interested in the formation of bimetallic and trimetallic carboxylates and alkoxides which can be used as single source precursors for such mixed metal oxides. Sb(dmae)/sub 3/ (dmae=OCH/sub 2/CH/sub 2/(CH/sub 3/)sub 2/ has been prepared from Sb(OC/sub 2/H/sub 5/)/sub 3/ and Hdmae and used to generate the bimetallic materials Sb(dmae)/sub 3/Cd(acac)/sub 2/. Sn(acac)/sub 2/ hydrolyses to yield crystalline cage Sn/sub 4/O/sub 6/(dmae)/sub 4/. Sn(dmae)/sub 2/ can also be used to generate bimetallic materials such as [Sn(dmae)/sub 2/ Cd(acac)/sub 2/]/sub 2/]. Bimetallic and trimetallic carboxylates of general formula [R/sub 3/Ge-CHRCH/sub 2/COO]/sub 4-n/SnRn. [Where R=CH/sub 3/, C/sub 2/H/sub 5/, C/sub 6/H/sub 5/, tolyl, cyclohexyl, (CH/sub 3/)/sub 3/ Si CH/sub 2/-etc.] have been prepared and characterized by various analytic techniques. Chemical vapor deposition using Sb(dmae)/sub 3/ Cd(acac)/sub 2/ and various bimetallic carboxylates yield thin films of Cd/sub 2/Sb/sub 2/O/sub 7/ and SnOGeO respectively. (author)