To use mesoporous silicas as low-k materials, the pore entrances must be really small to avoid diffusion of metals that can increase the dielectric constant of the low-k dielectric. In this paper we present a new method to narrow the pores of mesoporous materials through grafting of a cyclic-bridged organosilane precursor. As mesoporous material, the well-studied MCM-41 powder was selected to allow an easy characterization of the grafting reactions. Firstly, the successful grafting of the cyclic-bridged organosilane precursor on MCM-41 is presented. Secondly, it is demonstrated that pore narrowing can be obtained without losing porosity by removing the porogen template after grafting. The remaining silanols in the pores can then be end-capped with hexamethyl disilazane (HMDS) to make the material completely hydrophobic. Finally, we applied the pore narrowing method on organosilica films to prove that this method is also successful on existing low-k materials.
Keywords: MCM-41; bridged organosilanes; pore sealing.