Production of TiN thin films by N2-laser-ablated Ti atoms in nitrogen gas atmospheres

Laser ablation has proven to be an important technique for thin film deposition because of the high velocity heating and quenching of materials. We have used a nitrogen laser, which is capable of producing nanosecond pulses of intense UV (337.1 nm) radiation to generate high-temperature and high-electron-density plasmas when strongly focused on titanium targets. Laser beam pulses with a peak energy of 32 J/cm² and a power density of 1.6 GW/cm² were used in this experiment. As ablated Ti species are allowed to expand further in a nitrogen atmosphere, they cool down and eventually dissipate. In this sequence, they meet a substrate where condensation, nucleation, and growth processes yield TiN thin films because of the reaction with the nitrogen gas. Thin film depositions were made on stainless steel (AISI 1020 and AISI 304) substrates at nitrogen gas pressures ranging from 10^-1 Pa to 200 Pa and for different distances between the substrate and the spot where the laser beam was focused upon the target. For rather short distances (less than 7 mm), optical microscopy shows the effect of a further plasma-thin film interaction, while at larger distances, the depositions exhibit a regular film condensation from the vapor. Microstructure characterization of the thin film deposited was done by several techniques. The typical cubic TiN phase was identified by transmission electron microscopy (TEM) and energy dispersion spectroscopy (EDS).