Preparation of thin anodic alumina membranes and their utilization for template electrodeposition

Abstract

A method for the preparation of arrays of anodic aluminium-oxide porous films on a metal frame is proposed. The suggested approach makes it possible to obtain very thin porous-oxide films possessing a high mechanical strength, which are suitable for various practical applications such as templates for the formation of one-dimensional nanostructures or membranes for gas separation and liquid filtration. To demonstrate the possibility of the utilization of thin anodic alumina films as the templates for nanowire formation, cobalt nanowires with 50 nm diameter are prepared using 5 μm thick alumina membranes.