Effect of microstructural evolution on magnetic properties of Ni thin films

Copyright © Indian Academy of Sciences.The magnetic properties of Ni thin films, in the range 20–500 nm, at the crystalline-nanocrystalline interface are reported. The effect of thickness, substrate and substrate temperature has been studied. For the films deposited at ambient temperatures on borosilicate glass substrates, the crystallite size, coercive field and magnetization energy density first increase and achieve a maximum at a critical value of thickness and decrease thereafter. At a thickness of 50 nm, the films deposited at ambient temperature onto borosilicate glass, MgO and silicon do not exhibit long-range order but are magnetic as is evident from the non-zero coercive field and magnetization energy. Phase contrast microscopy revealed that the grain sizes increase from a value of 30–50 nm at ambient temperature to 120–150 nm at 503 K and remain approximately constant in this range up to 593 K. The existence of grain boundary walls of width 30–50 nm is demonstrated using phase contrast images. The grain boundary area also stagnates at higher substrate temperature. There is pronounced shape anisotropy as evidenced by the increased aspect ratio of the grains as a function of substrate temperature. Nickel thin films of 50 nm show the absence of long-range crystalline order at ambient temperature growth conditions and a preferred [111] orientation at higher substrate temperatures. Thin films are found to be thermally relaxed at elevated deposition temperature and having large compressive strain at ambient temperature. This transition from nanocrystalline to crystalline order causes a peak in the coercive field in the region of transition as a function of thickness and substrate temperature. The saturation magnetization on the other hand increases with increase in substrate temperature.University Grants Commission for Centre of Advanced Studies in Physic

A review of ion beam assisted deposition of optical thin films

A review of the current status of ion assisted deposition of optical thin films is presented. The different kinds of ion sources and their relative merits and demerits are discussed. This is followed by a discussion of the various theoretical models currently in use to explain ion-surface interactions in such a process and finally the properties of oxide thin films deposited using ion assisted deposition are discussed

Chromium-Induced Nanocrystallization of a-Si Thin Films into the Wurtzite Structure

Chromium metal-induced nanocrystallization of amorphous silicon (a-Si) thin films is reported. The nanocrystalline nature of these films is confirmed from X-ray diffraction and Raman spectroscopy. Significantly, the deconvolution of Raman spectra reveals that the thin films were crystallized in a mixed phase of cubic diamond and wurzite structure as evidenced by the lines at 512 and 496 cm−1, respectively. The crystallite sizes were between 4 to 8 nm. Optical properties of the crystallized silicon, derived from spectral transmittance curves, revealed high transmission in the region above the band gap. Optical band gap varied between 1.3 to 2.0 eV depending on the nature of crystallinity of these films and remained unaltered with increase in Cr addition from 5 to 30%. This signifies that the electronic structure of the nanocrystalline Silicon films is not affected considerably inspite of the presence of metal silicides and the process of crystallization

Structure and composition related properties of titania thin films

The dependence of optical constants, structure and composition of titania thin films on the process parameters has been investigated. Films were deposited using both reactive electron beam evaporation and ion Assisted Deposition(IAD). If has been observed that the refractive index of IAD films is higher than that for the reactively deposited films, without much difference in the extinction coefficient. Electron paramagnetic resonance has been used to estimate qualitatively the presence of non-stoichiometry in the films. It has been found that these spectra correlate very well the optical behaviour of the films. X-ray diffraction studies revealed that the neutral oxygen deposited films were stress free, while the IAD films showed tensile stress. The lattice parameters showed anisotropic change with ion beam parameters