Synthesis and characterisation of thin films in the B–C–N triangle

Abstract

International audienceIn this study, about 400 nm thick BCN films with different compositions were grown by reactive DC magnetron sputtering of a B4C target by varying the N2/Ar proportion in the sputtering gas from 0 to 50%. The microstructures of the films were determined by FE-SEM. The chemical composition was determined by electron probe microanalyser (EPMA). The crystallinity of the films was studied by grazing incidence XRD analyses. FTIR was used to determine the chemical bonding structures. The elemental depth profiles of the films were obtained from SIMS measurements. Nanoindentation and wear tests were used to determine the mechanical and tribological properties. Hardness, elastic modulus and wear rates of BCN films were significantly decreased with the increase of nitrogen in the coating composition. The results demonstrated that thin films in the ternary triangle B–C–N with tailored properties can easily be deposited by reactive DC magnetron sputtering with varying N2 flow rates

Recent advances in ternary two-dimensional materials: synthesis, properties and applications

“…101 For example, welladherent BCN thin films with different compositions were grown by the reactive DC magnetron sputtering of a B4C target with different nitrogen flows. 104 A further example is the deposition of BCN coatings with controlled atomic compositions using the IBAD technique with composite C/B targets. 101 Beniwal et al utilized thermally induced dehydrogenation of the B2N2C2H12 precursor molecules and formed an epitaxial BCN monolayer on Ir (111) through covalent bond formation.…”

Self-Ordered Orientation of Crystalline Hexagonal Boron Nitride Nanodomains Embedded in Boron Carbonitride Films for Band Gap Engineering

“…This is usually correlated to the fact that elemental and/or binary phase segregation would occur instead of forming a uniform BCN network [16,31,32]. During the growth process, B, C, and N atoms prefer to combine differently as a result of their chemical properties, for example, B and C can exist both as elements and as part of compounds, while N could exist in the films only as compound [27,[33][34][35]. Indeed, taking the advantage of the immiscibility between BN and graphite [23,36], the layer by layer composite structure of h-BN and graphene, planar BCN nanosheets consisting of h-BN domains, and h-BN nanosheets containing graphene quantum dots have been synthesized successfully, and have demonstrated the superior capability of manipulating their band gap [17,[37][38][39].…”

Microstructure and Performance of a Porous Polymer Membrane with a Copper Nano-Layer Using Vapor-Induced Phase Separation Combined with Magnetron Sputtering

“…Metalized PVDF membranes were prepared by a high vacuum magnetron sputtering system (GP450i, Beiyi Technology Co., Ltd., Beijing, China), with copper as the target and high purity Ar (99.9 at.%) as the environmental gas. The reaction conditions were as follows: substrate temperature of 25 °C, vacuum level below 10 −5 mbar, and power of 40 W. Prior to the deposition of copper, the Cu target was pre-sputtered in an argon atmosphere for 30 min [ 16 ]. The deposition rate was varied to alter the membrane thickness, while the other parameters were fixed.…”