A diamond-like carbon (DLC) film with a nanostructured surface can be produced in a two-step process. At first, a metal-containing DLC film is deposited. Here, the combination of plasma source ion implantation using a hydrocarbon gas and magnetron sputtering of a zinc target was used. Next, the metal particles within the surface are dissolved by an etchant (HNO3:H2O solution in this case). Since Zn particles in the surface of Zn-DLC films have a diameter of 100–200 nm, the resulting surface structures possess the same dimensions, thus covering a range that is accessible neither by mask deposition techniques nor by etching of other metal-containing DLC films, such as Cu-DLC. The surface morphology of the etched Zn-DLC films depends on the initial metal content of the film. With a low zinc concentration of about 10 at.%, separate holes are produced within the surface. Higher zinc concentrations (40 at.% or above) lead to a surface with an intrinsic roughness.

Antiferromagnets with non‐collinear spin structures display various properties that make them attractive for spintronic devices. Some of the most interesting examples are an anomalous Hall effect despite negligible magnetization and a spin Hall effect with unusual spin polarization directions. However, these effects can only be observed when the sample is set predominantly into a single antiferromagnetic domain state. This can only be achieved when the compensated spin structure is perturbed and displays weak moments due to spin canting that allows for external domain control. In thin films of cubic non‐collinear antiferromagnets, this imbalance is previously assumed to require tetragonal distortions induced by substrate strain. Here, it is shown that in Mn3SnN and Mn3GaN, spin canting is due to structural symmetry lowering induced by large displacements of the magnetic manganese atoms away from high‐symmetry positions. These displacements remain hidden in X‐ray diffraction when only probing the lattice metric and require measurement of a large set of scattering vectors to resolve the local atomic positions. In Mn3SnN, the induced net moments enable the observation of the anomalous Hall effect with an unusual temperature dependence, which is conjectured to result from a bulk‐like temperature‐dependent coherent spin rotation within the kagome plane.

Zinc-containing diamond-like carbon films were prepared by a combination of magnetron sputtering of a zinc target and plasma source ion implantation and deposition in a hydrocarbon atmosphere. The effect of the preparation conditions on the film properties, such as surface morphology, film structure, Zn content, hardness and friction coefficient, was evaluated. A wide range of Zn contents can be realized, with films becoming rougher and softer with increasing Zn content. The films possess remarkable Zn-rich features as observed in SEM images. Depending on the Zn concentration, the features evolve from dots into more network-like structures.