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Studies of the Growth and Local Atomic Bonding of a-CxNyHz Films

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  10 February 2011

H. Efstathiadis ,
Z. Akkerman  and
F. W. Smith
H. Efstathiadis
Affiliation:
Center for Advanced Thin Film Technology, University at Albany - SUNY.
Z. Akkerman
Affiliation:
CVC Corp., Fremont, CA.
F. W. Smith
Affiliation:
Department of Physics, City College of the City University of New York.
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Abstract

A systematic study of the growth and local atomic bonding (LAB) of a series of a-CxNyHz alloy films prepared via plasma enhanced chemical vapor deposition (PECVD) from mixtures of NH3/C2H2 and N2/C2H2 is presented. The effects of the reactants and their ratio on the film composition and bonding of hydrogen, the optical constants, and the optical energy gap have been determined. It is found that the presence of nitrogen and hydrogen in the plasma decreases the net film deposition rate due to enhanced etching and that incorporation of nitrogen into the film is limited to N/C ≈0.1. For the films deposited from N2/C2H2 as the concentration of N in the film increases, the concentration of C also increases while that of H decreases. No evidence for the type of bonding expected in the theoretically-predicted C3N4 compound has been found. It is observed that hydrogen is preferentially bonded to nitrogen and there is evidence for N-H…N hydrogen bonding in the films. The predictions of the free energy model (FEM) previously developed for the bonding in a-CxNyHz alloys are compared with these experimental results. The importance of entropy in determining the most stable state of these alloys is demonstrated. The FEM successfully predicts and explains some of the experimentally-observed properties of the alloys.

Type
Research Article
Information
MRS Online Proceedings Library (OPL) , Volume 498: Symposium AA – Covalently Bonded Disordered Thin-Film Materials , 1997 , 277
Copyright
Copyright © Materials Research Society 1998

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References

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