Synthesis of metal nitrides by low-energy ion assisted film growth

In this short report the influence of the low-energy ion bombardment of gro wing films on the structural properties is demonstrated and discussed. The preferred orientation and texture are measured in dependence on the ion ene rgy, angle of incidence and film thickness. The preferred orientation is ch anged from a {111} alignment of the TiN crystallites to the {100} orientati on with increase of ion energy and ion current density. The film formation at ion bombardment under a specifically selected angle results in a totally fixed orientation or biaxial texture of the crystallites. The measurements also show that the {100} biaxial texture is changed to a {111} biaxial tex ture with increase of the film thickness. The crystalline structure of epit axial GaN films on c-plane sapphire depends strongly on the ion beam parame ter. To obtain high quality films low ion energies are required. Pole figur e measurements show that even with unadvantageous growth parameters the GaN films remain epitaxial. (C) 2001 Elsevier Science B.V. All rights reserved .