Influence of Different CH sub(4)/N sub(2) Ratios on Structural and Mechanical Properties of a-CN sub(x):H Film Synthesized Using Plasma Focus

• Published in: Journal of fusion energy 2014-12, Vol.33 (6), p.640-647
• Main Authors: Umar, Z A, Ahmad, R, Rawat, R S, Hussnain, A, Khalid, N, Chen, Z, Shen, L, Zhang, Z, Hussain, T
• Format: Article
• Language: English
• Subjects: Admixtures; Carbon nitride; Deposition; Elastic modulus; Hardness; Modulus of elasticity; Shot; X-ray photoelectron spectroscopy
• ISSN: 0164-0313; 1572-9591
• DOI: 10.1007/s10894-014-9723-4

Carbon nitride films were synthesized by operating the dense plasma focus device with different CH sub(4)/N sub(2) admixture gas ratios and fixed 20 focus shots. The pressure and axial distance from anode tip were kept constant at 3 mbar and 8 cm respectively. Raman and X-ray photoelectron spectroscopy (XPS) techniques were used to observe the effect of CH sub(4)/N sub(2) ratio on carbon nitride bonding. The XPS analysis showed that the terminating group C identical with N is more dominant for the films synthesized using higher concentration of nitrogen which gives softer films. Field emission scanning electron microscopy results showed that the deposited films consist of nanoparticles and their agglomerates. The size of agglomerates increases with decreasing concentration of nitrogen in CH sub(4)/N sub(2) admixture gas. Nanoindentation results showed the increase in hardness and elastic modulus values of films with decreasing concentration of nitrogen in CH sub(4)/N sub(2) admixture gas. The hardness and elastic modulus values were found to be dependent on sp super(3) content in the film as well as the C identical with N. The hardness and elastic modulus values of 10.7 and 229.8 GPa respectively were achieved for the films deposited with fixed 20 focus deposition shots and using CH sub(4)/N sub(2) admixture gas ratio of 7:3.