Mark J. Miller, Junlan Wang
Jan 16, 2015
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1
Influential Citations
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Journal
Journal of Applied Physics
Abstract
Vanadium(IV) oxide (VO2) is a unique material that undergoes a reversible phase transformation around 68 °C. The material could potentially be used as an energy-efficient coating for windows since its reflectance in the infrared (IR) increases significantly more than in the visible region. Currently, VO2 is limited by a transition temperature (τc) that is too high, luminous transmittance that is too low or both. In this study, a transition temperature of 45 °C is achieved for a reactively sputtered, undoped film by restricting grain size to approximately 30 nm. It is concluded that a higher density of grain boundaries (smaller grain size) provides a greater number of nucleating defects which in turn reduces τc. Similarly, a higher density of grain boundaries may reduce the hysteresis width (difference between transition temperatures in heating and cooling). Also in this study, a new set of optical performance metrics is proposed in which the solar spectrum is divided into the ultraviolet (UV), visible and...