Dielectric and optical properties of nanometric nickel silicides from valence electrons energy-loss spectroscopy experiments

Valence and Core Electron Energy Loss Spectroscopy (VEELS and CEELS) experiments are performed from nanocrystallized nickel silicide thin films. Three different silicide compounds are identified in the films. Their chemical compositions are determined from Ni-L(2,3) to Si-K core edges quantification. The results obtained are coherent within less than 2% error with the pure Ni2Si, NiSi and NiSi2 phases. The analysis of the shape and energy position of Ni-L(2,3) near edge structures and volume plasmon peaks indicates that both are reliable signatures to identify unambiguously each compound. Nickel silicides low-loss spectra have been submitted as references to the EELS database (www.cemes.fr~eelsdb). Low-loss spectra are processed to extract single scattering spectra and determine the dielectric function. The results show that nickel silicides dielectric functions deduced from VEELS are in quite good agreement with epsilon1 and epsilon2 deduced from ellipsometry experiments. The optical properties (refractive index (n), absorption coefficient (k), reflectivity (R%) and resistivity (rho(opt))), calculated from VEELS dielectric function are then compared in details with the data resulting from others techniques available in the literature. We show that, except some minor divergences, the nickel silicides optical properties are generally well reproduced. This indicates that VEELS is a relevant technique for accessing reliably to physical properties and can be a successful alternative to conventional techniques when high spatial resolution is needed.