Oxidation behavior of TiN and Ti-Ni-N-O thin films prepared by pulsed laser deposition

Abstract

This chapter discusses the oxidation behavior of titanium nitride (TIN) and titanium nickel oxynitride (Ti-Ni-N-O) thin films prepared by pulsed laser deposition. Ti-Ni-N-O thin films are successfully prepared by a pulsed laser deposition (PLD) method. TlN thin films are widely used as a hard coating material for cutting tools, since they have high hardness and oxidation resistance. However, in recent years, to increase the durability of coating materials, it has been required to develop new materials having superior characteristics more than TiN. The ternary compounds based on TiN have been actively investigated. In particular, titanium aluminum nitride (Ti-A1-N) and titanium silicon nitride (Ti-Si-N) thin films have been reported to indicate high hardness and oxidation resistance. The hardness of the Ti-AI-N and Ti-Si-N thin films increased respectively due to solid solution hardening and dislocation pinning which induced by the decrease in crystal size.