Mössbauer study of gamma‴-iron nitride film

In-situ growth of iron mononitride thin films studied using x-ray absorption spectroscopy and nuclear resonant scattering

“…3.4 In-situ NRS measurements at 100 K From our room temperature (300 K) in-situ NRS, XRR, and N K-edge XANES measurements, the information obtained can be summarized as (i) irrespective of the thickness, FeN films were non-magnetic at 300 K (ii) the N K-edge XANES pattern of ultrathin films (< 5 nm) show a different characteristics indicating that films may undergo a structural transition from RS to ZB-type as thickness increases beyond 5-10 nm. As evidenced by Yamada et al [42], the RS-type FeN has a AFM ground state with T N ≈ 220 K, therefore by doing NRS measurements at low temperatures (below 220 K) it should be possible to verify if films become magnetic as expected for FeN in the RS-type structure.…”

“…FeN compounds were extensively studied by Schaff et al [23][24][25][26] in late 1990s. Subsequently, FeN thin films were synthesized using ion beam sputtering [27], dc/rf magnetron sputtering [28][29][30][31][32][33][34][35][36][37][38], pulsed laser deposition (PLD) [39][40][41][42], high power impulse magnetron sputtering [43], nitrogen plasma assisted molecular beam epitaxy (MBE) [44][45][46][47][48] and very recently under HPHT [12,16,[49][50][51]. From applications points of view, the mononitride FeN is also very interesting as its oxidation resistance makes it a effective catalyst in chemical reactions [52,53], it can be used as a precursor to yield magnetic phases in a controlled way [38,44,54,55] and also in biomedical applications [17].…”

“…From a review of recent experimental works probing the magnetic ground state of FeN, it can be seen that irrespective of its LP (4.3 or 4.5Å), FeN remains nonmagnetic down to 2 K. An exception to this, are studies performed by Usui and Yamada [41,42] and earlier works of Nakagawa [20], Suzuki [21] and Hinomura [22] et al In all these works a magnetic phase was found at low temperature but along with an oxide phase. Usui and Yamada [41,42] deposited FeN films using PLD and by varying the nitrogen partial pressure they synthesized ZB-type γ -FeN and RStype γ -FeN. In these works low temperature (down to 5 K) 57 Fe Mössbauer spectroscopy measurements were carried out and it was concluded that γ -FeN remain NM and γ -FeN become AFM at low temperature.…”

Preparation of high performance bulk Fe–N alloy by spark plasma sintering

“…The γ′-Fe 4 N is also a common phase after surface nitriding of steel products, which provides high hardness, excellent wear, and corrosion resistance [1,13]. In contrast, ζ-Fe 2 N has anti-ferromagnetic properties below 9 K, γ″-FeN y is non-magnetic at 4.2 K, and γ‴-FeN y is an antiferromagnet with a surprisingly large hyperfine magnetic field of 49 T [5,14].…”

“…For example, pulsed laser deposition [14], molecular beam epitaxy (MBE) [15][16], facing target sputtering [17][18], magnetron sputtering [19][20], ion implantation [21][22], and RF reactive sputtering [23], were used to create Fe-N films at lower temperature. Mechanical alloying, chemical reaction, and nitriding were used to produce Fe-N powders from room temperature to 700°C [24][25][26].…”