PROPERTIES OF REACTIVE MAGNETRON SPUTTERED RUTHENIUM OXIDE THIN FILMS BEFORE AND AFTER PLASMA IMMERSION ION IMPLANTATION OF NITROGEN

RuO₂ thin films were prepared on Si substrates by reactive unbalanced magnetron sputtering in Ar + O₂ mixture using planar ruthenium target of 50 mm in diameter. Films were sputtered in constant voltage mode at power of 100 W at different total pressures in the range from 0.2 to 15 Pa and partial pressure of O₂ from 0 to 80% at different temperatures up to 500 °C and negative bias voltage. We investigated the crystallographic nature of films by x-ray diffraction.  EDAX and XPS measurements confirmed the presence of Ru and O in films, RBS measurements shown changes of the composition with bias voltage. It was found that there are changes of film structure with partial oxygen and total pressures, temperature and substrate bias voltage. We evaluated peak shifts of rutile phase refer to a tensile strain in films material. We used Plasma Immersion Ion Implantation (PIII) technique to implant nitrogen to the rutile film structure. Colour change of film material after implantation of nitrogen was measured. We observed crystallographic structure and compositional changes of implanted material using XRD measurements and XPS deep profile measurements by comparing measured spectra before and after implantation. A change of structure of implanted material towards metallic like structure was found. We measured nano-hardness of as- deposited films and ones implanted with nitrogen. PIII process considerably decreases nano-hardness of RuO₂ films.