Abstract
Boron nitride (BN) thin films were deposited on monocrystalline Si(100) wafers using electron beam evaporation of boron with simultaneous bombardment by nitrogen and argon ions. The effect of film thickness on the resultant BN phase was investigated using Fourier transform infrared (FTIR) spectroscopy and high resolution transmission electron microscopy (HRTEM). These techniques revealed the consecutive deposition of an initial 20 A thick layer of amorphous BN, 20–50 A of hexagonal BN having a layered structure, and a final layer of the polycrystalline cubic phase. The growth sequence of the layers is believed to result primarily from increasing biaxial compressive stresses. Favorable surface and interface energy and crystallographic relationships may also assist in the nucleation of the cubic and the hexagonal phases, respectively. The presence of the amorphous and hexagonal regions explains why there have been no reports of the growth of 100% cubic boron nitride on Si.
| Original language | English |
|---|---|
| Pages (from-to) | 1213-1216 |
| Number of pages | 4 |
| Journal | Journal of Materials Research |
| Volume | 8 |
| Issue number | 6 |
| DOIs | |
| State | Published - Jun 1993 |
| Externally published | Yes |
Funding
The authors express their appreciation to the Electronic Materials Center of Kobe Steel, USA and the Strategic Defense Initiative through the Office of Naval Research and via Contract No. N00014-92-J-1720 for support of this research, to Professor D. R. McKenzie for helpful discussions and for making available a preprint of Ref. 11, and to Professor J. Angus of Case Western Reserve University for the information regarding the deposition of diamond on pyrolytic graphite and for giving us a preprint of the paper describing this research. A portion of the electron microscopy was performed in the HTML User Facility, sponsored by the United States Department of Energy, Assistant Secretary for Conservation and Renewable Energy, Office of Transportation Technologies, under Contract DE AC0584OR021400 managed by Martin Marietta Energy Systems, Inc.
| Funders | Funder number |
|---|---|
| Assistant Secretary for Conservation and Renewable Energy | |
| Electronic Materials Center of Kobe Steel | |
| Office of Transportation Technologies | DE AC0584OR021400 |
| United States Department of Energy | |
| Office of Naval Research |