Preferentially oriented growth of diamond films on silicon with nickel interlayer

Abstract A multistep deposition technique is developed to produce highly oriented diamond films by hot filament chemical vapor (HFCVD) on Si (111) substrates. The orientation produced use of a thin, 5–20 nm, Ni interlayer. Annealing studies demonstrate diffusion into form nickel silicides with crystal structure depending temperature. HFCVD film interlayer results in reduced non-diamond carbon, low surface roughness, high quality, and increased texturing relative growth bare silicon wafers. X-ray diffraction show that the grown 10 nm yielded 92.5% grains along (110) planes ~ 2.5 µm thickness large average grain size 1.45 based scanning electron microscopy. Texture also observed develop for 300 thick 89.0% plane direction. These are significantly better than without layer same conditions. interlayers explained proposed model wherein nano-diamond seeds becoming β 1 -Ni 3 forms during nucleation period. explains silicidation processes. Article Highlights High quality minimum roughness ~93% crystallographic direction substrate using thin 5 20 layer. detailed report formation different phases silicide, its stability temperature, role at condition presented. grow quality-oriented established.