Stability improvement of TaN thin films used as resistive thermoconductive vacuum gauges

Abstract

TaN thin films used as resistive thermoconductive vacuum gauges are prepared by reactive ion beam sputtering. We examine the stability of TaN thin films deposited at the substrate temperature up to 800 °C. Moreover, we consider the relation between the stability and the accuracy of the vacuum gauge. As a result, we obtain the TaN thin films with high stability such that the resistance change after aging for 1000 h in air at 150 °C is only 0.08%. This resistance change corresponds to the pressure error of 2×10−3 Torr for the vacuum gauge.