Amorphous carbon nitride for high temperature capacitor dielectric

Amorphous carbon nitride (CNx) film is being investigated for use as a high temperature dielectric for high energy density, high pulse power capacitors. It is anticipated that CNx will display properties of high thermal conductivity, thermal stability, electrical resistance, and electrical breakdown strength. Through control of the vacuum environment and deposition parameters of a dual ion-beam assisted, ion-beam sputter deposition system, CNx films were recently created with Nitrogen-to-Carbon (N/C) ratios up to 0.70. Elemental analysis using Rutherford-Backscattering Spectroscopy (RBS) and Elastic Recoil Spectroscopy (ERS) on CNx samples annealed in 99.999% argon shows that the resulting films are thermally stable up to 500 °C. Capacitance measurements performed on these CNx films reveal resistivities up to 1 × 1012 Ω cm.