The effects of deposition and test conditions on nanomechanical behaviour of ultrathin films produced by plasma-enhanced chemical vapour deposition process at atmospheric pressure

Abstract

Nanometer thick films have been deposited on silicon substrate by plasma-enhanced chemical vapour deposition (PE-CVD) process using non-homogenous, filamentary dielectric-barrier discharge (DBD) at atmospheric pressure. This film deposition technique enables the introduction some organic fragments into the coating material—silicon dioxide (or oxynitride)—resulting in good properties for self-lubrication of micro-electro-mechanical systems (MEMS) devices. The effect of the deposition conditions and loading rates on the hardness and the elasticity modulus of the films are presented in this paper.