Fabrication and optical constants of amorphous copper nitride thin films prepared by ion beam assisted dc magnetron reactive sputtering

摘要

A novel implementation of simultaneous use of ion beam assisted deposition (IBAD) and reactive dc magnetron sputtering of a metal copper target in pure nitrogen plasma to produce thin films of amorphous copper nitride (a-Cu_xN) is described. This technique produced amorphous thin films, very stable and optically comparable with crystalline copper nitride (Cu_3N) films produced by several deposition methods. The work also reports on the optical characteristics and determination of the optical constants of this material following a recently introduced method of calculations, PUMA. The optical energy gap 2.03 +- 0.0342 eV deduced from the transmittances measurements is slightly higher than that reported for the Cu_3N films over a range of 1.2-1.9 eV.