Dewetting regimes in ultra-thin nanocrystalline Ag films

• Published in: Materials letters 2023-04, Vol.336, p.133863, Article 133863
• Main Authors: Roa, Simón, Burgos, María José Cortes
• Format: Article
• Language: English
• Subjects: Annealing treatments; Dewetting mechanisms; Ultra-thin metallic films
• ISSN: 0167-577X; 1873-4979
• DOI: 10.1016/j.matlet.2023.133863

•Annealing effects on the dewetting of sputtered ultra-thin Ag films were studied.•Different temperatures were used to activate different dewetting regimes.•Dewetting regime activation threshold is strongly dependent on film thickness.•Different nanostructures can be fabricated by Dewetting-Regime Engineering (DRE).•DRE is a useful method to design systems of potential interest in optoelectronics. Annealing-induced dewetting in ultra-thin metallic films continues to be a hot topic because of their prospects for developing versatile components in different optoelectronic applications. In this work, we present a brief but significant study about the effects of high vacuum annealing on the dewetting of sputtered ultra-thin Ag films. Results suggest that the activation threshold of different dewetting regimes is strongly dependent on the initial film thickness and annealing temperature. This enables the fabrication of Ag nanostructures with different microstructural features, which can be tuned by choosing adequate thickness and annealing conditions. This study shows that dewetting-regime engineering to achieve different Ag nanostructures can be a useful method to design optoelectronic components with perspectives to potential applications Thin-Film Solar Cells (TFSCs) and Surface-Enhanced Raman Spectroscopy (SERS).