RUTHENIUM OXIDE FILMS PREPARED BY REACTIVE UNBALANCED MAGNETRON SPUTTERING

Dalibor Búc - Milan Mikula - Denis Music - Ulf Helmersson - Ping Jin - Setsuo Nakao - Kwok Yan Li - Po Wan Shum - Zhifeng Zhou - Mária Čaplovičová

   We prepared RuO₂ thin films on Si substrates by reactive unbalanced magnetron sputtering in Ar+O₂ gas mixture using a planar round ruthenium target of 50mm in diameter. Films were sputtered in the constant voltage mode at a power of 10W, total pressures in the range from 0.2 to 10Pa and partial pressure of O₂ from 0 to 80% at temperatures up to 600^o and negative substrate dc bias voltage. The crystallographic nature of films was investigated by x-ray diffraction. RBS measurements revealed changes of composition with the bias voltage. It was found that there were changes of structure, electrical and mechanical properties with the oxygen flow ratio, substrate temperature and bias voltage. Nanoindentation measurements were used to evaluate the hardness and reduced modulus of films.

Keywords: ruthenium oxide, reactive magnetron sputtering

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