Date of Award
2019
Document Type
Thesis
Degree Name
Master of Science in Engineering (MSE)
Department
Chemical and Materials Engineering
Committee Chair
Yu Lei
Committee Member
Michael Banish
Committee Member
Anuradha Subramanian
Subject(s)
Thin films., Silver., Atomic layer deposition.
Abstract
Thermal Atomic Layer Deposition (ALD) is a powerful method used to deposit highly uniform thin films. It has been repeatedly demonstrated in literature that ALD is capable of generating thin films of various metals and metal oxides (among other materials) upon a variety of substrates with extremely precise thickness control. The self-limiting nature of the ALD mechanism makes it an ideal candidate for use in the nanoscale. The objective of this work is to determine a method of generating continuous silver thin films of less than ten nanometers using our ALD system. To achieve this result, procedures of depositing silver thin films previously documented in literature were investigated and expanded upon. Characterization techniques such as quartz crystal microbalance (QCM), x-ray diffraction (XRD), and spectroscopic ellipsometry were used to describe key information about these processes, such as film growth rate, precursor saturation, and the ALD temperature window.
Recommended Citation
Sienicki, William, "Synthesis of silver thin films via atomic layer deposition" (2019). Theses. 282.
https://louis.uah.edu/uah-theses/282