Sputtering Voltage in the Growth of Vanadium Oxide Thin Films

Vanadium oxide thin films have been deposited by reactive DC magnetron sputtering. The results showed that the sputtering voltage has a special change behavior in Ar condition and Ar/O₂ mixed conditions. With O₂ gas flow input instantaneously, the sputtering voltage climbs quickly, and then tends to be stable shortly. Also, the sputtering voltage evolution appears a hysteretic loop characteristics with O₂ gas supplied increasing and decreasing. The sputtering voltage behavior observed is related to the ion induced secondary electron emission (ISEE) coefficient of the target material. The ISEE coefficient of the oxidized vanadium on target surface is lower than the ISEE coefficient of the pure vanadium metal, which is not in agreement with the generally accepted idea that the ISEE coefficient of oxides is much larger than for metals.

Keywords:

• Vanadium oxide thin film deposition
• sputtering voltage
• ISEE coefficient
• S-M phase transition.

Acknowledgments

This work was supported by National Natural Science Foundation of China under Grant Nos. 61101030.