Paramagnetic centres and microstructure of reactively sputtered amorphous carbon nitride thin films

摘要

We discuss the structural (Raman, infrared) and paramagnetic (electron-spin-resonance) characterisation of a set of amorphous carbon nitride thin films. Some features of the ESR signal are different with respect to non-nitrogenated sp~2-rich amorphous carbons (a-C). For instance, the temperature dependence of the ESR line-width indicates that the spin mobility may occur by hopping and not by extended states as in a-C. The peculiar ESR features of a more semimetallic-like sample, are discussed.