A Toth, M Mohai, T Ujvari, I Bertoti

Chemical structure of silicon-, oxygen- and nitrogen-containing a-C : H films prepared by RF plasma beam CVD

Thin Solid Films 482 (2005) 183-187

Si-, SiOx- and SiNx-containing a-C:H films (denoted as DLCSi, DLCSiO and DLCSiN) were deposited respectively from tetramethylsilane, hexamethyldisiloxane and hexamethyldisilazane precursors onto silicon wafer and aluminium substrates by electron cyclotron wave resonance (ECWR) RF plasma beam CVD. The chemical composition and the bonding states of the constituent elements were characterised by X-ray photoelectron spectroscopy and X-ray induced Auger electron spectroscopy. Compared to the composition of the precursors, significant loss of C for each layer and some loss of N for the DLCSiN layers were obtained, while the O/Si ratios for the DLCSiO layers remained practically unaltered. The modified Auger parameter of Si (Si U.) decreased with increasing oxygen content and increased with increasing N content for the DLCSiO and DLCSiN layers. Si a was proposed to reflect the degree of crosslinking. For the DLCSiO and DLCSiN layers Si a. could be altered by the deposition conditions (self-bias). The appearance of Si-O bonds was inferred from the valence band analysis of an Ar+ ion bombarded DLCSi layer containing O-contarnination. (c) 2004 Published by Elsevier B.V.

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