Substrate Temperature Range Research Articles

Exploring impact, spreading, and bonding dynamics in molten metal deposition for novel drop-on-demand printing

This study delves into the dynamics of molten metal deposition (MMD)-based drop-on-demand (DoD) printing, focusing on the interaction between aluminum droplets and substrates. Nozzle-to-substrate distances below 20 mm prevent droplet pinch-off, while distances exceeding 40 mm result in no droplet-substrate adhesion. Operating within the substrate temperature range of 350–550 °C is crucial, avoiding delamination, and shrinkage pits at lower temperatures, and substrate deformation and heightened oxidation at higher temperatures. Droplet adhesion is impeded at nozzle temperatures below 700 °C. Impact-driven and inviscid, DoD-MMD exhibits spreading outpacing overall solidification, particularly at higher temperatures. Surface tension forces dominate, influencing droplet spreading and leading to underdamped interfacial oscillations. Weak droplet-substrate adherence, facilitated by Van der Waals forces, allows easy droplet detachment, beneficial for successive drop-on-drop deposition. Unique to DoD-MMD, ridges along the droplet periphery act as solidification paths, influenced by thermal contraction and surface tension. The spherical pancake shape of the droplet, characterized by a solidification angle >90°, is elucidated through Weber and Freezing numbers. The final deposited droplet width to initial diameter ratio increases with the droplet temperature and deposition height. In contrast to other metal DoD studies, the spreading factor decreases with a rise in substrate temperature, attributed to intensified oxidation at higher substrate temperatures.

Changes in boiling regime and heat transfer effectiveness during water droplet collision with a superheated wall

We experimentally investigated changes in boiling regime and heat transfer effectiveness when single droplets collided with superheated substrates at various initial temperatures. Saturated water droplets colliding at constant speeds were studied over a range of initial substrate temperatures that spanned all boiling regimes from nucleate through transition to film boiling. Space- and time-resolved infrared thermometry and convectional shadowgraph imaging were used to precisely derive local heat transfer distributions and detect characteristic boiling regimes. The results confirmed the existence of the typical regions of a boiling curve: nucleate, transition, and film. The transition boiling regime could be subdivided into three sub-regimes—bubbly, oscillating, and fingering—during which the heat transfer effectiveness (THE) varied in a non-linear manner, exhibiting local minima and maxima. To facilitate interpretation of non-linear variations in HTE during transition boiling, the basic physical parameters of local heat flux, contact area, and residence time were quantitatively measured using obtained thermometry images. In the transition boiling regime, HTE first rapidly decreased during bubbly boiling principally because of a substantial decrease in the droplet residence time. And THE increased during oscillating boiling because of contact area expansion and increased heat flux. Finally, THE decreased during fingering boiling due to substantial reduction in the area fraction of liquid contact. When liquid-solid contact was completely prohibited, stable film boiling was stable. Thus, the dynamic Leidenfrost temperature point could be detected based on heat transfer characteristics, rather than collision dynamics.

Growth of epitaxial (100)-oriented rare-earth nitrides on (100)LaAlO3

Epitaxial growth of (100)-oriented rare-earth nitrides (RENs) SmN, GdN, and DyN on (100)LaAlO3 (LAO) substrates is demonstrated using molecular beam epitaxy. RHEED and ϕ-scans confirm that the cubic RENs grow 45° rotated with respect to the pseudocubic (100)-surface of LAO, which leads to lattice mismatches between −5.8% and −8.7% for the selected RENs. Those lattice mismatches, despite being significant, are smaller than in previously reported epitaxial (100)RENs, with the exception of growth on (100)YSZ (yttria stabilized zirconia), which however causes the formation of an interface oxide layer. The SmN RHEED pattern shows intense streaks, indicating a high quality, flat surface, and the rocking curves are among the narrowest reported for (100)RENs. In contrast to growth on Si, the epitaxial RENs readily form over a wide range of substrate temperatures, without the need of special substrate treatment or intermediate layers. This robust, high quality growth paired with their clear magnetic switching behavior makes epitaxial RENs grown on LAO ideal candidates for future spintronic devices.

Surface Equilibration Mechanism Controls the Stability of a Model Codeposited Glass Mixture of Organic Semiconductors

While previous work has identified the conditions for preparing ultrastable single-component organic glasses by physical vapor deposition (PVD), little is known about the stability of codeposited mixtures. Here, we prepared binary PVD glasses of organic semiconductors, TPD (N,N'-Bis(3-methylphenyl)-N,N'-diphenylbenzidine) and m-MTDATA (4,4',4″-Tris[phenyl(m-tolyl)amino]triphenylamine), with a 50:50 mass concentration over a wide range of substrate temperatures (Tsub). The enthalpy and kinetic stability are evaluated with differential scanning calorimetry and spectroscopic ellipsometry. Binary organic semiconductor glasses with exceptional thermodynamic and kinetic stability comparable to the most stable single-component organic glasses are obtained when deposited at Tsub = 0.78-0.90Tg (where Tg is the conventional glass transition temperature). When deposited at 0.94Tg, the enthalpy of the m-MTDATA/TPD glass equals that expected for the equilibrium liquid at that temperature. Thus, the surface equilibration mechanism previously advanced for single-component PVD glasses is also applicable for these codeposited glasses. These results provide an avenue for designing high-performance organic electronic devices.

Epitaxial synthesis of unintentionally doped p-type SnO (001) via suboxide molecular beam epitaxy

By employing a mixed SnO2 + Sn source, we demonstrate suboxide molecular beam epitaxy (S-MBE) growth of phase-pure single-crystalline metastable SnO (001) thin films on Y-stabilized ZrO2 (001) substrates at a growth rate of ∼1.0 nm/min without the need for additional oxygen. These films grow epitaxially across a wide substrate temperature range from 150 to 450 °C. Hence, we present an alternative pathway to overcome the limitations of high Sn or SnO2 cell temperatures and narrow growth windows encountered in previous MBE growth of metastable SnO. In situ laser reflectometry and line-of-sight quadrupole mass spectrometry were used to investigate the rate of SnO desorption as a function of substrate temperature. While SnO ad-molecule desorption at TS = 450 °C was growth-rate limiting, the SnO films did not desorb at this temperature after growth in vacuum. The SnO (001) thin films are transparent and unintentionally p-type doped, with hole concentrations and mobilities in the range of 0.9–6.0 × 1018 cm−3 and 2.0–5.5 cm2 V−1 s−1, respectively. These p-type SnO films obtained at low substrate temperatures are promising for back-end-of-line (BEOL) compatible applications and for integration with n-type oxides in pn heterojunctions and field-effect transistors.

Deposition Mechanism and Properties of Plasma-Enhanced Atomic Layer Deposited Gallium Nitride Films with Different Substrate Temperatures

Gallium nitride (GaN) is a wide bandgap semiconductor with remarkable chemical and thermal stability, making it a competitive candidate for a variety of optoelectronic applications. In this study, GaN films are grown using a plasma-enhanced atomic layer deposition (PEALD) with trimethylgallium (TMG) and NH3 plasma. The effect of substrate temperature on growth mechanism and properties of the PEALD GaN films is systematically studied. The experimental results show that the self-limiting surface chemical reactions occur in the substrate temperature range of 250-350 °C. The substrate temperature strongly affects the crystalline structure, which is nearly amorphous at below 250 °C, with (100) as the major phase at below 400 °C, and (002) dominated at higher temperatures. The X-ray photoelectron spectroscopy spectra reveals the unintentional oxygen incorporation into the films in the forms of Ga2O3 and Ga-OH. The amount of Ga-O component decreases, whereas the Ga-Ga component rapidly increases at 400 and 450 °C, due to the decomposition of TMG. The substrate temperature of 350 °C with the highest amount of Ga-N bonds is, therefore, considered the optimum substrate temperature. This study is helpful for improving the quality of PEALD GaN films.

Temperature optimization of NiO hole transport layer prepared by atomic layer deposition

Atomic layer deposited (ALD) nickel oxide (NiO) thin film is frequently utilized as a hole transport layer (HTL) for perovskite solar cells (PSCs). Particularly nickel(II) 1-dimethylamino-2-methyl-2-butoxide (Ni(dmamb)2) precursor and ozone reactant are used for NiO film deposition. The substrate temperature effect on the stoichiometric composition for oxygen vacancies defects and electrical properties such as mobility is crucial, affecting further device performance. In the present study, NiO thin films are grown using the ALD method at a substrate temperature range between 180 to 250 °C on SiO2/Si substrates. Next, the effect of substrate temperature on the film composition, valence levels, nickel oxidation states, oxygen vacancies, and electrical properties was systematically examined, not to mention film growth, thickness, morphology, crystallinity, and optical properties. At 180 °C, the film growth rate was 0.017 nm/cycle, which was increased to 0.025 nm/cycle at 250 °C. All grown NiO films exhibited polycrystalline cubic crystal orientation, and the (200) plane simultaneously Ni3+ phase coexists with the Ni2+ phase. Furthermore, the electrical resistivity and mobility increased from 2.36 – 3.24 × 102 Ω.cm and 9.6–21.9 cm2V−1s−1 with substrate temperatures of 180 °C–230 °C. The prepared NiO films were optically transparent, >70% in the visible region, and the Ultraviolet photoelectron spectroscopy (UPS) study revealed that the variation in the valance band and conduction bands critically depended on the growth temperature. Thus, our findings reveal that the chemical and electrical characteristics of deposited NiO thin film are precisely influenced by substrate temperature; it will also offer considerable promise for developing NiO HTL concerning PSCs device improvement.

Selective Area Epitaxy of GaN Nanowires on Si Substrates Using Microsphere Lithography: Experiment and Theory.

GaN nanowires were grown using selective area plasma-assisted molecular beam epitaxy on SiOx/Si(111) substrates patterned with microsphere lithography. For the first time, the temperature–Ga/N2 flux ratio map was established for selective area epitaxy of GaN nanowires. It is shown that the growth selectivity for GaN nanowires without any parasitic growth on a silica mask can be obtained in a relatively narrow range of substrate temperatures and Ga/N2 flux ratios. A model was developed that explains the selective growth range, which appeared to be highly sensitive to the growth temperature and Ga flux, as well as to the radius and pitch of the patterned pinholes. High crystal quality in the GaN nanowires was confirmed through low-temperature photoluminescence measurements.

Variations in the Physical Properties of RF-Sputtered CdS Thin Films Observed at Substrate Temperatures Ranging from 25 °C to 500 °C.

CdS films with a wide range of substrate temperatures as deposition parameters were fabricated on Corning Eagle 2000 glass substrates using RF magnetron sputtering. The crystallographic structure, microscopic surface texture, and stoichiometric and optical properties of each CdS film deposited at various substrate temperatures were observed to be highly temperature-dependent. The grown CdS thin films revealed a polycrystalline structure in which a cubic phase was mixed based on a hexagonal wurtzite phase. The relative intensity of the H(002)/C(111) peak, which represents the direction of the preferential growth plane, enhanced as the temperatures climbed from 25 °C to 350 °C. On the contrary, the intensity of the main growth peak at the higher temperatures of 450 °C and 500 °C was significantly reduced and exhibited amorphous-like behavior. The sharp absorption edge revealed in the transmission spectrum shifted from the long wavelength to the short wavelength region with the rise in the substrate temperature. The bandgap showed a tendency to widen from 2.38 eV to 2.97 eV when the temperatures increased from 25 °C to 350 °C. The CdS films grown at the temperatures of 450 °C and 500 °C exhibited glass-like transmittance with almost no interference fringes of light, which resulted in wide bandgap values of 3.09 eV and 4.19 eV, respectively.

In situ monitoring atomic layer doping processes for Al-doped ZnO layers: Competitive nature of surface reactions between metal precursors

In this work, surface reactions during the atomic layer doping (ALDp) process of aluminum-doped zinc oxide (AZO) films have been studied. Conventional supercycle and alternative quasi-simultaneous codosing methods are analyzed within the 100–200 °C substrate temperature range. Two quasi-simultaneous codosing cases are investigated: (1) diethylzinc (DEZ) followed by trimethylaluminum (TMA) and (ii) TMA followed by DEZ. Quasi-simultaneous codosing experiments featured back-to-back DEZ/TMA or TMA/DEZ precursor and H2O pulses separated by nitrogen (N2) purge cycles. The grown films were characterized via (i) real-time in situ ellipsometry to monitor the individual surface ligand exchange reactions via variations in the film thickness in each half-cycle; (ii) ex situ ellipsometry to determine the film optical constants; (iii) x-ray photoelectron spectroscopy to measure the elemental composition and chemical bonding structure, and (iv) x-ray diffraction to evaluate the crystal properties. The most significant finding of the study is the dominance of TMA over DEZ: for all of the quasi-simultaneous codosing samples, no matter which precursor is pulsed first and whether there is a time delay between TMA and DEZ pulses or not, zinc (Zn) incorporation within the AZO films is substantially lower than aluminum (Al). This result demonstrates the competitive nature of surface reactions between TMA and DEZ, where the winning side is TMA. Al is effectively incorporating into the film while severely limiting Zn-incorporation and even replacing chemisorbed Zn-groups via conversion surface reactions. As a result, the quasi-simultaneous codosing approach for AZO films using DEZ and TMA precursors leads to minimally (less than 2%) Zn-doped Al2O3 films (ZAO), depicting the advantages of controlled ALDp process via the conventional supercycle method.

Design and implementation of a microcontroller based electrostatic spray pyrolysis instrument for thin film deposition

This research is focused on the design and implementation of a microcontroller based electrostatic spray pyrolysis instrument that can sense and regulate temperature change with an alternating current to direct current converter in the range of 220V-1KV AC to 20KV DC for thin film deposition. In spray pyrolysis technique precise management of the spray parameters helps to create good and uniform thin films with ease of reproducibility of film properties. However it is a draw back in the manually operated electrostatic spray pyrolysis instrument mostly used in developing countries of Africa which causes variations in film structure, thickness, associated film properties and difficulty of reproducibility of film properties. The need for improved locally made ESP unit is also timely due to the inadequacy/unavailability of thin film deposition apparatus in most African institutions/materials research laboratories. The circuit was simulated on Multism software and transfer to PCB, etching was done using Lead (II) oxide while the unit components where assembled by soldering of electronics components, bonding and drilling of associated components. Arduinounoatmega 328 micro controller was employed. The fabricated device operated at 1KV to 20KV dc voltage for film deposition, at a substrate temperature range of 100oC to 450oC with a steady flow rate of 0.04ml/min, define spray pattern, define precursor usage and a precise control of major deposition parameters. ZnO:Al thin film deposited with the equipment was found to have a crystalline structure of fine grains.  Â

Effect of substrate temperature on sputter-deposited boron carbide films

Sputter deposition of B4C films with tailored physical properties remains a challenge. Here, we systematically study how substrate temperature influences the properties of B4C films deposited by direct current magnetron sputtering onto planar substrates held at temperatures in the range of 100−510°C. Results show that all films are amorphous stoichiometric B4C, with low O content of ∼1 at. %. Films deposited onto substrates at 100°C exhibit high compressive residual stress and decreased mechanical properties. For elevated substrate temperatures in the range of 180−510°C, film mass density, surface roughness, Young’s modulus, and hardness are weakly dependent on substrate temperature. However, in this temperature range, an increase in substrate temperature leads to larger residual compressive stress accompanied by a corresponding reduction in the concentration of nanoscale inhomogeneities. At least for the landing atom ballistics conditions studied here, a substrate temperature range of ∼185−250°C is optimum for growing films with near-zero intrinsic residual stress. The overall weak substrate temperature dependence of film properties revealed in this work is favorable for the development of a robust deposition process, particularly for the case of deposition onto non-planar substrates where temperature control is often challenging.

Microbial Community Response to Polysaccharide Amendment in Anoxic Hydrothermal Sediments of the Guaymas Basin.

Organic-rich, hydrothermal sediments of the Guaymas Basin are inhabited by diverse microbial communities including many uncultured lineages with unknown metabolic potential. Here we investigated the short-term effect of polysaccharide amendment on a sediment microbial community to identify taxa involved in the initial stage of macromolecule degradation. We incubated anoxic sediment with cellulose, chitin, laminarin, and starch and analyzed the total and active microbial communities using bioorthogonal non-canonical amino acid tagging (BONCAT) combined with fluorescence-activated cell sorting (FACS) and 16S rRNA gene amplicon sequencing. Our results show a response of an initially minor but diverse population of Clostridia particularly after amendment with the lower molecular weight polymers starch and laminarin. Thus, Clostridia may readily become key contributors to the heterotrophic community in Guaymas Basin sediments when substrate availability and temperature range permit their metabolic activity and growth, which expands our appreciation of the potential diversity and niche differentiation of heterotrophs in hydrothermally influenced sediments. BONCAT-FACS, although challenging in its application to complex samples, detected metabolic responses prior to growth and thus can provide complementary insight into a microbial community’s metabolic potential and succession pattern. As a primary application of BONCAT-FACS on a diverse deep-sea sediment community, our study highlights important considerations and demonstrates inherent limitations associated with this experimental approach.

Influence of substrate temperature and oxygen pressure on the structural and optical properties of polycrystalline BaTiO3 thin films grown by PLD

The effect of substrate temperature and oxygen pressure on linear and nonlinear optical properties of pulsed laser deposited barium titanate BaTiO3 (BTO) thin films is reported in the present manuscript. BTO thin films have been deposited on n-type Si (100) and quartz substrates in the range of substrate temperatures from 400 to 700 °C and oxygen pressures from 0.005 to 1 mbar. The root means square (RMS) surface roughness is observed to decrease with the rise in substrate temperature and increased with an increase in oxygen pressure. The optimum background pressure and the substrate temperature are observed to be around ∼0.1 mbar and 700 °C, respectively. All the BTO thin films are found to be in the preferential (110) plane, from X-ray Diffraction (XRD), indicating the pseudocubic phase. Raman analysis also confirms the pseudocubic phase of BTO for all the thin films. The crystallite size, measured from XRD analysis is found to be increased with the increase in substrate temperature and is also affected by the background oxygen pressure. The thickness, linear absorption coefficient, and refractive index of the thin films are determined from UV–Visible–NIR spectroscopy. Transmission is observed to be 75–85% for all the thin films in the spectral range of 400–2000 nm. Nonlinear optical properties (NLO) are studied by an in-house assembled modified Z-scan set-up using continuous-wave (cw) Ar-Ion laser (λ = 488 nm) and found to be (57.54 ± 0.05) cm/W at the optimum deposition parameters.

Swift heavy ion beam stimulated epitaxial recrystallization of Si/SiO2 heterostructure

Ion beam induced epitaxial crystallization of Si/SiO2 heterostructure has attracted significant interest in device fabrication because of its low-temperature processing. In this report, we have used 200 keV Kr+ ions to amorphize the Si/SiO2 layer at room temperature and 100 MeV Ni7+ swift heavy ions to recrystallize at elevated substrate temperature range of 100–300 °C. The regrowth of amorphous layers and out-diffusion of Kr+ ions confirmed by Rutherford backscattering spectrometry channeling (RBS-C) measurement. The layer-by-layer growth of epitaxial recrystallization during high energetic ion irradiation is elucidated by the thermal spike-induced vacancy migration mechanism near the amorphous/crystalline (a/c) interface.

Exploring mechanism of enzyme catalysis by on-chip transient kinetics coupled with global data analysis and molecular modeling

<h2>Summary</h2> The ability to engineer enzymes for industrial and biomedical applications is primarily limited by a paucity of mechanistic understanding. To gain insight into the mechanisms of enzyme catalysis, one must screen enormous numbers of discrete reaction conditions, which is a laborious task using conventional technologies. To address such limitations, we develop a droplet-based microfluidic platform for high-throughput acquisition of transient kinetic data over a range of substrate concentrations and temperatures. When compared with conventional methods, our platform reduces assay volumes by six orders of magnitude and increases throughput to 9,000 reactions/min. To demonstrate their utility, we measure the transient kinetics of three model enzymes, namely, β-galactosidase, horseradish peroxidase, and microperoxidase. Additionally, we conduct a complex kinetic and thermodynamic study of engineered variants of haloalkane dehalogenases. Datasets are globally analyzed and complemented by molecular dynamics simulations, providing new insights into the molecular basis of substrate specificity and the role of hydration-related entropy.

Using Deposition Rate and Substrate Temperature to Manipulate Liquid Crystal-Like Order in a Vapor-Deposited Hexagonal Columnar Glass.

We investigate vapor-deposited glasses of a phenanthroperylene ester, known to form an equilibrium hexagonal columnar phase, and show that liquid crystal-like order can be manipulated by the choice of deposition rate and substrate temperature during deposition. We find that rate-temperature superposition (RTS)-the equivalence of lowering the deposition rate and increasing the substrate temperature-can be used to predict and control the molecular orientation in vapor-deposited glasses over a wide range of substrate temperatures (0.75-1.0 Tg). This work extends RTS to a new structural motif, hexagonal columnar liquid crystal order, which is being explored for organic electronic applications. By several metrics, including the apparent average face-to-face nearest-neighbor distance, physical vapor deposition (PVD) glasses of the phenanthroperylene ester are as ordered as the glass prepared by cooling the equilibrium liquid crystal. By other measures, the PVD glasses are less ordered than the cooled liquid crystal. We explain the difference in the maximum attainable order with the existence of a gradient in molecular mobility at the free surface of a liquid crystal and its impact upon different mechanisms of structural rearrangement. This free surface equilibration mechanism explains the success of the RTS principle and provides guidance regarding the types of order most readily enhanced by vapor deposition. This work extends the applicability of RTS to include molecular systems with a diverse range of higher-order liquid-crystalline morphologies that could be useful for new organic electronic applications.

The microstructural and stress evolution in sputter deposited Ni thin films

We report the stress and microstructural evolution for a series of Ni thin films sputter deposited over a range of rates (0.076 and 0.250 nm/s), pressures (0.27, 0.67 and 1.33 Pa), and substrate temperatures (ambient, 100, and 200 °C). In general, as the sputtering pressure increased, the stress-thickness product, measured by wafer curvature, became tensile and trended with an increase in pressure regardless of the deposition rate. However, at the lowest sputtering rate and highest substrate temperature, the films exhibited a compressive growth stress. The collective data was then fitted to a kinetic model that accounts for the stress generation at the grain boundaries, from grain growth, and from the creation of defects within the film. The model's predicted fitted parameters matched well to the experimental measurements except for films deposited at the lowest deposition pressure. These particular films exhibited a bimodal grain size distribution which could not be accommodated by the model's use of a singular grain diameter. Nevertheless, in monomodal grain sizes, the results do provide support for the kinetic model in helping to ascertain the various contributing factors for the intrinsic stress development and their microstructural relationship in context to the Thornton zonal morphology descriptors for thin films and coatings. • First use of a kinetic stress model to Ni sputter deposition • Kinetic model fits yield good agreement to experimental monomodal grain sizes. • Ascertaining energetic-based contributions to stress with varied process parameters.

Hard silicon carbonitride thin‐film coatings produced by remote hydrogen plasma chemical vapor deposition using aminosilane and silazane precursors. 1: Deposition mechanism, chemical structure, and surface morphology

AbstractAmorphous silicon carbonitride films were produced by remote hydrogen microwave plasma chemical vapor deposition (RP‐CVD) using aminosilanes: (dimethylamino)dimethylsilane, bis(dimethylamino)methylsilane, and tris(dimethylamino)silane, as well as disilazanes: 1,1,3,3‐tetramethyldisilazane and 1,3‐bis(dimethylsilyl)‐2,2,4,4‐tetramethylcyclodisilazane as single‐source precursors. The effect of substrate temperature (TS) on the rate and yield of the RP‐CVD process, chemical composition, chemical structure, and surface morphology of resulting films is reported. The temperature dependencies of thickness‐based growth rate and growth yield of the film imply that for a low substrate temperature range (TS = 30–200°C), deposition rate and yield are limited by desorption of film‐forming precursors from a growth surface, whereas for a high substrate temperature range (TS = 200–400°C), the rate and yield values, independent of the temperature, are nearly constant and the RP‐CVD is a nonthermally activated process. The increase of the substrate temperature from 30°C to 400°C causes the elimination of organic groups from the film and the formation of a silicon carbonitride network structure with a predominant content of Si–N nitridic and Si–C carbidic bonds. On the basis of structural study and literature data, hypothetical elementary reactions contributing to the film formation process are postulated. The films were found to be morphologically homogeneous, defect‐free materials exhibiting very small surface roughness, which varied in a narrow range of values.

Resolving self-limiting growth in silicon nitride plasma enhanced atomic layer deposition with tris-dimethylamino silane precursor

Self-limiting character of the involved surface reactions is essential for highly uniform and conformal growth in atomic layer deposition (ALD). However, the poor conformal coverage (&amp;lt;75%) that is often reported with silicon nitride (SiNx) plasma enhanced ALD (PEALD) processes using metalorganic Si-precursors is confounding. In this article, we report our study of the SiNx PEALD process using the tris-dimethylamino silane (3DMAS) precursor and forming gas (5% H2–95% N2) reactant plasma. For the substrate temperature (Tsub) range of 50 °C ≤ Tsub ≤ 150 °C, growth per cycle (GPC) for SiNx deposition was found to approach saturation at 0.034 ± 0.001 nm/cycle though higher Tsub required longer 3DMAS exposures (tA) for saturation. However, for Tsub &amp;gt; 150 °C, SiNx GPC was seen to increase with tA, indicating nonself-limiting growth from potential chemical vapor deposition-like side reactions emerging at higher temperatures. The refractive index (n) of 2.097 ± 0.003 at 2 eV with an optical bandgap of ∼1.7 eV determined from in situ spectroscopic ellipsometry measurements, and peaks s1 and n1 with ΔBE = 295.42 eV in Si2p and N1s XPS spectra measured on the capped SiNx sample were found to agree with the optical constants and chemical characteristics reported for the silicon nitride material. SiNx films deposited at Tsub = 250 °C (nonself-limiting) were found to be more resistant to ambient oxidation as compared to SiNx PEALD films grown at Tsub = 100 °C. Although an entire 30 nm thick SiNx PEALD film was oxidized after an unavoidable long ambient exposure, a cross-sectional transmission electron microscope image showed a conformal coverage of 95%–98% in a 3D trench structure with an aspect ratio of 4.5. Furthermore, higher resistance to ambient oxidation in plasma treated of SiNx PEALD films demonstrates a potential of postgrowth treatments to improve desirable material properties without resorting to high-temperature processes.