In this study, Cu thin films with layer thicknesses of 5, 25, and 50 nm were prepared by DC magnetron-sputtering method and their three dimensional (3-D) surface topography were investigated. Concretely, the 3-D surface roughness of samples was studied by atomic force microscopy (AFM), fractal analysis of the 3-D AFM-images and power spectral density (PSD) function. Also the content of thin films was characterized by X-ray diffraction (XRD). The thin films were prepared onto glass and p-type silicon (100) substrates by DC magnetron-sputtering method and were studied over square areas of 4.4 lm 9 4.4 lm using AFM and fractal analysis. The 3-D surface morphology revealed the fractal geometry of Cu thin films at nanometer scale, which can be quantitatively estimated by the fractal dimension D f that was determined by cube counting method, based on the linear interpolation type. The results from AFM data indicated the possible presence of superstructures on the growth process of Cu nanostructures that were in relatively good agreement with XRD data and PSD.

International audienceHere we report on the synthesis of binary transition metal nitride electrodes based on titanium vanadium nitride (TiVN) thin films. These films were deposited by a method compatible with micro-electronic processes which consists of DC co-sputtering of vanadium (V) and titanium (Ti) targets. TiVN films with different Ti/V ratio were deposited. A dependence of the capacitance and the cycling stability with the Ti/V atomic ratio in the films was established. While V rich sample exhibits a Faradic behavior that limits its cycling ability despite a high areal and volumetric capacity, the addition of Ti in the film drastically improves the cycling ability with virtually no fade in capacitance after 10,000 cycles. Furthermore, a 1.1 Ti/V ratio leads to an areal capacitance up to 15 mF·cm− 2 in 1 M KOH electrolyte solution. Such electrodes shed light on the use of binary transition metal nitrides as candidate electrodes for micro-supercapacitor

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