Cathodic vacuum arc is a deposition technique which exhibits unique properties, such as high ion energy, high ionization rate and multiple ion charge states, depending on the cathodic materials. The drawback lies in the presence of macroparticles in the plasma thus preventing this technique from being widely applied. However, in the past decade, much effort had been focused on the elimination of macroparticles and the most successful approach is the use of curved magnetic filters to effectively separate the plasma from the macroparticles. The filtered cathodic vacuum arc (FCVA) refers to the combined cathodic arc with the magnetic filters. This article reports on the fundamentals related to vacuum arc, and the basic concept behind the magnetic filters and its effectiveness in the removal of macroparticles. This promising technique has been further applied to the deposition of metal oxide thin films, which is an important group of materials. The properties of various metal oxide thin films, such as titanium oxide, aluminum oxide, zinc oxide, zirconium oxide, transparent conducting oxides and other oxides, deposited by the FCVA are reviewed in this article. In addition, some applications of the metal oxide thin films will be discussed.

Review of metal oxide films deposited by filtered cathodic vacuum arc technique

Cu films prepared by bipolar pulsed high power impulse magnetron sputtering

Apart from the scientific interest, texture development in copper thin films is of crucial importance to their applications as interconnects or corrosion resistant coating. We report here a dominant 〈110〉 texture of copper thin films—preferred for oxidation-resistant applications—deposited by direct current magnetron sputtering. Scanning electron microscopy shows that the copper films go through a transition from 〈111〉 columns to 〈110〉 hillocks as the deposition proceeds. Cross-sectional transmission electron microscopy (TEM) indicates that the 〈110〉 grains nucleate at boundaries of 〈111〉 grains. Further, we have proposed a stress-driven nucleation and growth model of 〈110〉 grains based on the x-ray diffraction characterization and the TEM observations.

/pdf/development-of-110-texture-in-copper-thin-films-1r1n5v6nde.pdf

Development of 〈110〉 texture in copper thin films

Recently, great attention has been devoted to the pulsed direct current (DC) reactive magnetron sputtering technique, due to its ability to reduce arcing and target poisoning, and its capability of producing insulating thin films. In this study, chromium nitride (CrN) coatings were deposited by the bipolar symmetric pulsed DC magnetron reactive sputtering process at different pulse frequency, substrate bias voltage, and the substrate temperature. It was observed that the texture of CrN changed from (111) to (200) as substrate temperature increased to 300°C as deposited at 2 kHz without substrate bias. With increasing pulsing bias and pulse frequency of target, predominated (200) orientation of CrN film was shown due to the ion bombardment/channeling effect to preferentially sputter those unaligned planes. For the CrN coatings deposited with pulsed biasing, the grain size decreased with increasing pulse frequency and substrate bias, whereas the surface roughness showed a reverse trend. The deposition rate of the CrN films decreased with increasing pulse frequency. It was concluded that the pulse frequency, substrate bias, and substrate temperature played important role in the texture, microstructure, and surface roughness of the CrN coatings deposited by the pulsed DC magnetron sputtering process.

The effects of substrate bias, substrate temperature, and pulse frequency on the microstructures of chromium nitride coatings deposited by pulsed direct current reactive magnetron sputtering

The much desired α (bcc) Tantalum (Ta) thin films are grown at room temperature using a newly designed cylindrical magnetron cathode (with rotating magnets geometry) with pulsing power. The new design has facilitated oblique incidence of adatoms. The electron temperature of the plasma has been enhanced due to the pulsing frequency (100 kHz). These two factors: oblique incidence of adatoms and enhanced electron temperature are presumed to be responsible for the formation of α phase Ta thin films at room temperature. The volume fractions of α and β phases have been evaluated from the X-ray data. The effect of pulsing (0–100 kHz) on the structural, electrical and mechanical properties of Ta thin films has also been studied. With the pulsing frequency, the lattice spacing in the Ta thin films increases (due to the incorporated argon) resulting in an increase in the compressive stress. Up to 75 kHz of the pulsing frequency, the Ta films formed are in the β phase (tetragonal) with ~ 13 nm grain size. At 100 kHz pulsing, the change in the surface morphology also indicates the phase change in the film.

Growth of nano crystalline near α phase tantalum thin films at room temperature using cylindrical magnetron cathode

Copper films were deposited by a novel off-plane double bend filtered cathodic vacuum arc technique at ambient temperatures. X-ray diffraction (XRD) and atomic force microscopy (AFM) are used to characterize the film’s structure and surface morphology. The substrate bending method was used to study the internal stress. The influence of substrate bias on the surface morphology, grain size, crystalline structure, and internal stress was systematically studied. XRD results indicate that all the deposited Cu films exhibit face-centered cubic-type (fcc) crystallite structure with (111) preferred orientation growth. The increase of substrate bias results in the improvement of (111) preferred orientation. At the substrate bias of 0 V, the deposited films are composed of nano-sized columnar grains, which contribute to the tensile stress in the deposited films. The grain size and surface roughness increase gradually with increasing substrate bias up to −200 V. Further increase of substrate bias results in the drastic decrease of grain size and surface roughness due to self-sputtering. The internal stress in the deposited films is also strongly dependent on the substrate bias. The increase of substrate bias results in the decrease of tensile stress in the deposited films, and the transition of tensile to compressive stress at the substrate bias of −300 V. Further increase of substrate bias results in the linear increase of compressive stress in the deposited films. At the substrate bias of −300 V, dense and stress-free Cu films can be obtained.

Influence of substrate bias on the microstructure and internal stress in Cu films deposited by filtered cathodic vacuum arc

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Influence of substrate bias on the microstructure and internal stress in Cu films deposited by filtered cathodic vacuum arc