Investigation of oxygen annealing effects on RF sputter deposited SiC thin films

Amorphous silicon carbide films were deposited by RF sputtering technique using a SiC target. These films were annealed in dry oxygen ambient in the temperature range of 400–700 °C. Subsequently the films were characterized using X-ray photoelectron spectroscopy (XPS) to investigate the chemical composition at each annealing temperature. XPS indicated that increasing the anneal temperature results in a decrease in SiC phase, and an increase in SiOx. Surface morphology of the oxidized films was characterized using atomic force microscope. Optical absorption studies indicated blue shifting effects as the annealing temperature was increased.