Amorphous SiN films grown by hot-filament chemical vapor deposition using monomethylamine

Abstract

Hot-filament chemical vapor deposition (hot-filament CVD) of silicon nitride films has been studied using silane and monomethylamine as source gases for the deposition temperature 600–800 °C. The deposition rate was about one order larger than that of thermochemical vapor deposition (thermo-CVD) using the same gases. The activation energy of the growth rate was 0.2 eV smaller than that of thermo-CVD. The hydrogen content was below the detection limit of infrared absorption measurements even in the film deposited at 600 °C. The film surface deposited at 700 °C had a smooth specular surface and the flatness of the hot-filament CVD films was the same as that of thermo-CVD films deposited at 100–200 °C higher temperatures.