DETECTION OF NITROGEN IN CVD DIAMOND

A series of CVD diamond films was analysed for their nitrogen content by high resolution elastic recoil detection (ERD) in order to investig ate the incorporation of nitrogen from the gas phase in a CVD reactor into the growing diamond film. CVD diamond films were deposited from a mixture of 1.5% CH4 in H-2 and an admixture of nitrogen gas varying f rom 0.33% up to 67% [N]/[C]. The measurements revealed that the probab ility of nitrogen incorporation is only about 0.4% with respect to car bon. In addition, the morphology and texture of the polycrystalline fi lms were investigated by scanning electron microscopy and X-ray textur e analysis and showed a significant dependence on the nitrogen admixtu re.