Preferential growth of Ti and TiN ®lms on Si(111) deposited by pulsed laser deposition

Ti and TiN ®lms have been grown by pulsed laser deposition (PLD) from a titanium target in reactive gas atmospheres of 1 mTorr Ar and 10 mTorr N2, respectively. The ®lms were deposited onto Si(111) substrates at temperatures of 200, 400 and 6008C. X-ray diffraction (XRD) revealed that the TiN ®lms exhibited a strong (100) orientation at all substrate temperatures. However, ®lms deposited at 2008C showed only (100) oriented grains, while those deposited at 400 and 6008C had an additional small component of grains with alternate orientations. Ti ®lms showed strong (100) at 200 and 4008C, but shifted to strong (002) at 6008C. The deposited ®lms exhibited densely-packed grains, with smooth and uniform structures. X-ray photoelectron spectroscopy (XPS) analysis of the ®lms showed 99.5% Ti in the Ti ®lms and 50% Ti, 45% N in TiN ®lms, indicating stoichiometric composition in the deposited ®lms. # 2001 Elsevier Science B.V. All rights reserved.