Heterostructures design for Hf-Nitride/V-Nitride system

• Deposition pressure effect on chemical, morphological and optical properties.
• Multilayers system with the epitaxial relation (111)[100]HfN//(200)[100]VN.
• Coherent assembly progress with relevant optical properties.
• Dispersion coefficient, index of refraction for HfN/VN in relation to bilayer thickness.

The multilayered films were grown via reactive r.f. magnetron sputtering technique by systematically varying the bilayer period (Λ) and the bilayer number (n), while maintaining constant the total coating thickness (~2.4 μm) on silicon(100) substrates. The multilayers were characterized through high-angle X-ray diffraction (HA-XRD), low-angle X-ray diffraction (LA-XRD), HfN and VN layers were analyzed via X-ray Photoelectron Spectroscopy (XPS) and electron and transmission microscopy (TEM). The HA-XRD results showed preferential growth in the face-centered cubic (111) crystal structure for HfN/VN multilayer systems with the (111)[100]HfN//(200)[100]VN epitaxial relation. The maximum coherent assembly was observed with presence of satellite peaks.