Abstract

Native oxide grown on copper has been a nuisance in electrical devices due to extra electrical resistance added to copper electrodes. However, copper oxide, known to have two primary stable phases, cuprous oxide (Cu<sub>2</sub>O) and cupric oxide (CuO), is a material worth investigating for electronic applications. These two phases exhibiting distinctive electrical characteristics, would make copper oxide a prospective material for resistive switches. Cu<sub>2</sub>O and CuO often form concurrently within the native oxide. Because of their similar refractive index and extinction coefficient, optically differentiating these two phases is a challenge, yet it is critical for designing devices. In this study, thin copper films were deposited using electron-beam evaporation and sputtering. A native oxide was grown on the prepared copper films over 250 days in air and periodically evaluated with reflectometry-ellipsometry. X-ray photoelectron spectroscopy was also performed on the samples aged for 7 months to obtain their chemical characteristics. A comprehensive analysis on the progressive formation of native oxide on copper is discussed.

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