Manganese compounds silicides

The fuels are finely powdered metals (2.0-10.0 g) among which titanium, zirconium, manganese, tungsten, molybdenum and antimony are very common. Sometimes, non-metal powders such as boron and silicon (for fast burning delays), binary alloy powders such as ferrosilicon, zirconium-nickel, aluminum-palladium and metal compounds such as antimony sulfide, calcium silicide etc. are also used. 

Silicon electrodes can also be stabilized by depositing a layer of compounds of oxides and silicides such as Ru02, molybdenum dinitrogen complexes, manganese oxide, indium-tin oxide, " aluminum oxide and aluminosilicate. In contrast to the noble metals, deposition of islands of Pb and Cd tends to inhibit hydrogen evolution in H2SO4 solution. ... 

Manganese silicide has the empirical formula MnSi and melts at 1280 C. It is insoluble in water but does dissolve in aqueous HF. (a) What type of compound do you expect MnSi to be metallic, molecular, covalent-network, or ionic (b) Write a likely balanced chemical equation for the reaction of MnSi with concentrated aqueous HF. 

The higher silicide of manganese is one of the few compounds of silicon with transition metals which have semiconducting properties. However, the problem of the chemical composition, crystal structure, and nature of this compound are still open questions despite all the work on this substance [1-5]. 

All the facts which we have presented enable us to come to some probable conclusions concerning the nature of the compound called the higher silicide of manganese. 

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