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Published online by Cambridge University Press: 11 March 2011
The reported work focuses on developing antidiffusion barriers capable to increase the thermal stability of metal contacts above 700 C. In the chosen approach, such an antidiffusion barrier consists of several bilayers of materials with different crystalline structures. It has been demonstrated that an interface between such materials effectively blocks the atomic interdiffusion. In this work the following groups of materials were used as the bilayers: ZrB2 and ZrN and TaSiN and TiN. The materials were deposited by means of room temperature sputtering from elemental and compound targets in inert Ar and reactive Ar+N2 atmospheres. The structures were characterised using secondary ion mass spectroscopy depth profiling and scanning electron microscopy cross sectional imaging directly after deposition and after degradation. I-V characteristics were measured and contact resistivities were determined from the circular transmission line method.