The next generation of heat exchangers and gas turbines require high performance materials as they need to operate at higher temperatures for higher efficiency. SiC and Si₃N₄ are promising candidates as they have excellent high temperature properties. However, when used in complex combustion environments found in gas-turbine applications, these materials have two major concerns; namely hot-corrosion and recession. It is well established that environmental barrier coatings (EBC) can be utilized to overcome these limitations.

Although chemical vapor deposited (CVD) mullite (3Al₂O ₃.2SiO₂) coatings developed before this study have shown promise in protecting Si-based substrates, there is concern that the silica content within the mullite coating itself might be susceptible to hot-corrosion and recession during long term exposure to corrosive atmospheres containing Na/V salts and water vapor. There is thus strong motivation to substantially reduce or even virtually eliminate the silica component from the surfaces of mullite coatings that are in direct contact with atmospheres containing corrosive oxides and steam.

In this study, CVD has been used to deposit mullite coatings with potential promise to protect Si-based ceramics for high temperature applications. The composition of these functionally graded mullite coatings was varied from silica-rich close to the coating/substrate (SiC) interface for coefficient of thermal expansion match to alumina-rich towards the outer surface of the coating. In the process, the highest alumina-rich mullite ever reported has been deposited. The phase transformation and hot-corrosion behavior of the coatings was also investigated in this work. The coatings show immense potential to protect Si-based ceramics. It is expected that these coatings will have very broad impact by enabling gas turbines to operate at higher temperatures leading to improved fuel efficiency and reduced emissions.