Simultaneous real-time x-ray diffraction spectroscopy, Rutherford backscattering spectrometry, and sheet resistance measurements to study thin film growth kinetics by Kissinger plots

Abstract

When the Kissinger method is used to investigate thin film growth kinetics, activation energies obtained are often significantly higher than those of Arrhenius plots based on isothermal studies. The reason for the higher activation energies is related to the sensitivity of the Kissinger analysis to nucleation effects. In fact, this often undesirable effect opens the possibility of studying nucleation barriers in a semiquantitative way. Furthermore, we show that these nucleation effects can be filtered out by a more careful application of the Kissinger method, and activation energies that are consistent with Arrhenius plots are then obtained

Nucleation and diffusion during growth of ternary Co1−xNixSi2 thin films studied by complementary techniques in real time

“…2. In another publication of this issue, 20 we could show that the apparent activation energy obtained for this point corresponds to the very initial stage of the MSi 2 formation, thanks to the comparison of simultaneous XRD and R s measurements on one hand and simultaneous RBS and R s measurements on the other hand. Plotted as a function of the Ni concentration in the metal alloy these data thus show that the presence of Ni in the metal alloy not only influences the initial growth and the formation temperature of the disilicide phase but also has a distinct influence on the reaction rate and growth kinetics of the mixed disilicide.…”

“…20 It turns out that the same relation holds for growing Co 1−x Ni x Si 2 films as shown graphically in Fig. 20 It turns out that the same relation holds for growing Co 1−x Ni x Si 2 films as shown graphically in Fig.…”

“…The construction of a modified Arrhenius plot, named after Kissinger, 15 allows one to obtain the apparent activation energy for the reaction. 20 Moreover, the use of a consistent approach for all films makes it possible to determine the influence of the alloying element on the thermodynamics and kinetics of the thin film growth. On one hand, it is often impossible to separate nucleation and diffusion effects, or grain boundary and lattice diffusion.…”

Temperature Robust Phase Change Memory Using Quaternary Material System Based on Ga2TeSb7

“…Both methods give activation energies considerably higher than that of the conventional Ge 2 Sb 2 Te 5 materials, in agreement with the high crystallization temperatures observed in Ga 2 TeSb 7 family. The discrepancies in activation energies obtained by these two methods can be attributed to the sensitivity of the Kissinger method to nucleation effects [4]. Relating activation energies to thermodynamic energies is not straightforward because it is difficult to separate nucleation effects from the diffusion effects, and grain boundary diffusion from lattice diffusion [4].…”

Determination of the dominant diffusing species during nickel and palladium germanide formation

“…Real-time techniques have the advantage of time efficiency (one obtains all the information from a single run), while at the same time it avoids missing any transient event which may occur during the process. A number of different in situ/real-time techniques have been developed in the past (some of which have been used to study metal germanides) including in situ X-ray diffraction [4,5,18], in-situ resistivity measurements [4,5,18,19], in situ cross-sectional transmission electron microscopy [20], in-situ laser light scattering [5,18,19] and real-time Rutherford backscattering spectrometry (RBS) [19,21]. For the present study we have chosen to employ real-time RBS as it is best suited for determining the position of the marker throughout the entire reactive process from a single sample [22].…”