Intertwisted fibrillar diamond-like carbon films prepared by electron cyclotron resonance microwave plasma enhanced chemical vapour deposition

In this paper, the structures, optical and mechanical properties of diamond-like carbon films are studied, which are prepared by a self-fabricated electron cyclotron resonance microwave plasma chemical vapour deposition method at room temperature in the ambient gases of mixed acetylene and nitrogen. The morphology and microstructure of the processed film are characterized by the atomic force microscope image, Raman spectra and middle Fourier transform infrared transmittance spectra, which reveal that there is an intertwisted fibrillar diamond-like structure in the film and the film is mainly composed of sp^3 CH, sp^3 C—C, sp^2 C═C, C═N and C_{60}. The film micro-hardness and bulk modulus are measured by a nano-indenter and the refractive constant and deposition rate are also calculated.