AVS 61st International Symposium & Exhibition
    Advanced Surface Engineering Monday Sessions
       Session SE+PS+TF-MoA

Paper SE+PS+TF-MoA8
Pulsed Magnetron Sputtering of Novel Multifunctional Films

Monday, November 10, 2014, 4:20 pm, Room 302

Session: Pulsed Plasmas in Surface Engineering
Presenter: Jaroslav Vlcek, University of West Bohemia, Czech Republic
Authors: J. Vlcek, University of West Bohemia, Czech Republic
J. Rezek, University of West Bohemia, Czech Republic
J. Kohout, University of West Bohemia, Czech Republic
Correspondent: Click to Email
High-power impulse magnetron sputtering with a pulsed reactive gas flow control was used for the reactive deposition of Ta-O-N films with tunable composition and properties [1]. The depositions were performed using a strongly unbalanced magnetron with a planar directly water-cooled Ta target in Ar-O2-N2 gas mixtures at an average target power density of up to 2.4 kWcm-2 in a pulse. The repetition frequency of pulses was 500 Hz at a fixed 50 µs voltage pulse length and the total pressure close to 2 Pa. An effective reactive gas flow control made it possible to adjust the film composition from Ta2O5 to a mixture of Ta3N5 and TaN. We prepared Ta-O-N films possessing appropriate band-edge levels for water splitting and a narrow optical band gap of 2.5 eV that permits a visible light absorption up to 500 nm.

Pulsed dc magnetron co-sputtering of a single target (B4C-Si, B4C-Zr or B4C-Hf-Si) in Ar-N2 gas mixtures was used for deposition of different multifunctional films. The repetition frequency of pulses was 10 kHz at a fixed 85 µs voltage pulse length and the total pressure of 0.5 Pa. We present the results obtained for amorphous Si-B-C-N films with an exceptionally high thermal stability (above 1500°C) and very high optical transparency [2], for nanostructured Zr-B-C-N films with a high hardness (37 GPa) and high electrical conductivity [3], and for nanostructured Hf-B-Si-C films with a high hardness (34-37 GPa), high electrical conductivity and significantly improved oxidation resistance in air up to 800°C [4].

[1] J.Rezek, J.Vlcek, J.Houska, R.Cerstvy, Thin Solid Films (submitted).

[2] J.Vlcek, P.Calta, P.Steidl, P.Zeman, R.Cerstvy, J.Houska, J.Kohout, Surf. Coat. Technol.

226 (2013) 34.

[3] J.Vlcek, P.Steidl, J.Kohout, R.Cerstvy, P.Zeman, S.Proksova, V.Perina, Surf. Coat. Technol. 215 (2013) 186.

[4] J.Kohout, J.Vlcek, J.Houska, P.Mares, R.Cerstvy, P.Zeman, M. Zhang, J.Jiang, E.I. Meletis, S. Zuzjakova, Surf. Coat. Technol. (submitted).