Growth of single crystal silver thin film induced by incident ion beam bombardment

Abstract

The single crystal silver thin film was fabricated on NaCl single crystal substrate by low energy ion beam assisted deposition technology. It was found that the microstructure of the silver thin film was sensitive to the incident ion beam bombardment parameters. Among the various experimental conditions studied, the single crystal silver thin film was only obtained at impinging angle of 45°, ion beam energy of 500 eV and current density of 6 μA cm−2. The growth mechanism of the single crystal thin film was discussed based on channeling effects and lattice matching between silver films and the substrates.