The Spray Deposition of Transition Metal Nitride thin Films Using Alcohol Based Precursor Solutions

Abstract

ABSTRACTA new alcohol solution based approach has been developed for preparing transition metal nitride thin films and coatings. In this technique, the metal of interest is dissolved as a chloride in acetonitrile, then chelated with triethanolamine to form a highly viscous solution which settles out of the solvent phase. The acetonitrile is then evaporated off and the remaining thick liquid precursor is easily diluted with water or methanol, yielding a semi-viscous liquid which can be used directly to coat various substrates. When heat treated under the appropriate conditions in ammonia, the precursor coating transforms to yield the corresponding nitride. This approach is currently being considered for preparing nitride-based thin film electrical components and has been successfully used thus far to spray deposit TaN and NbN nitride films onto silicon substrates. Results of the preliminary study on these two nitride films are discussed in this paper.