Morphology and Patterning Processes of Thin Organosilicon and Perfluorinated Bi‐Layer Plasma Polymer Films

Abstract

AbstractSummary: An audio‐frequency plasma polymerization set‐up with a planar plasma source was used to deposit thin bi‐layer plasma polymer films using heptadecafluoro‐1‐decene (HDFD) and hexamethyldisiloxane (HMDSO) as monomers. HDFD was used to deposit a thin Teflon‐like plasma polymer film with low surface energy. HMDSO was used to coat this layer with a highly cross‐linked SiCxOyHz film. The growth of the HMDSO plasma polymer illustrates the aspects of island formation at small film thickness (d < 10 nm) as a result of the low surface energy of the HDFD plasma polymer film surface and the buckling‐induced patterning by the compressive stress of the HMDSO plasma polymer film at higher film thickness (d > 10 nm). The film thickness was controlled by quartz crystal microbalance (QCM) and spectroscopic ellipsometry. The chemical structure of the films was measured by means of FT‐IR and XPS. The information about the surface morphology was provided by atomic force microscopy (AFM) measurements.AFM image (50 × 50 µm2) of anisotropic patterning of bi‐layer plasma polymer films (30 nm HMDSO film on top of a 100 nm HDFD film) on Si wafers at a point defect (dust particle).magnified imageAFM image (50 × 50 µm2) of anisotropic patterning of bi‐layer plasma polymer films (30 nm HMDSO film on top of a 100 nm HDFD film) on Si wafers at a point defect (dust particle).