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Thermal Stability of Nanostructured TiN-TiB2 Thin Films

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  01 February 2011

Paul H. Mayrhofer
Affiliation:
Department of Physical Metallurgy and Materials Testing, University of Leoben, A-8700 Leoben, Austria
Christian Mitterer
Affiliation:
Department of Physical Metallurgy and Materials Testing, University of Leoben, A-8700 Leoben, Austria
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Abstract

Nanocrystalline hard films have attracted increasing interest for wear-resistant applications. Especially, films within the system Ti-B-N with its numerous different phases are ideal candidates for materials science based studies on the nanoscale. In physical vapor deposited Ti-B-N films the nanostructure arises during growth by segregation-driven renucleation resulting in 2–3 nm sized TiN and TiB2 crystals. These films exhibit a hardness of ∼ 42 GPa in the as-deposited state which increases to ∼ 52 GPa during thermal annealing in vacuum. Here we show, that as-deposited films have a remarkable fraction of disordered regions surrounding TiN and TiB2 nanocrystals. During thermal annealing, the structural rearrangement causes the formation of compact boundary areas, leading to a hardness increase. At temperatures higher than 900 °C, the occurring B-loss, grain-growth, and recrystallization cause the hardness to decrease.

Type
Research Article
Copyright
Copyright © Materials Research Society 2005

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