Cathodic Arc Plasma Combinatorial Material Synthesis for Composition Search of New Amorphous Alloy
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0894-LL03-28.1
Cathodic Arc Plasma Combinatorial Material Synthesis for Composition Search of New Amorphous Alloy Seiichi Hata, Ryusuke Yamauchi1, Junpei Sakurai1 and Akira Shimokohbe1 Frontier Collaborative Research Center, Tokyo Institute of Technology, S2-8, 4259 Nagatuta, Midoriku, Yokohama, Japan. 1 Precision and Intelligence Laboratory, Tokyo Institute of Technology, R2-37, 4259 Nagatuta, Midoriku, Yokohama, Japan.
ABSTRACT Combinatorial arc plasma deposition (CAPD) method was used to search for new compositions of thin film amorphous alloys. A cathodic arc plasma gun (APG) was adopted as the deposition source for CAPD. The CAPD setup has three APGs radiating out from the center of a substrate. The APGs shoot pulse-like plasma shots one by one at a specific time interval. The plasma from each APG cathode is guided onto a specific area on a substrate by a magnetic field. Each such area overlaps the adjacent ones. Thus, a compositionally-graded thin film is deposited in the overlap area because of mixing of each deposited thin film from each APG that has a thickness grade. The deposited thin film is separated into 1,089 samples (the size of each is 1×1 mm2) using a grid on the substrate. The samples together are referred to as the thin film library. To demonstrate the capability of CAPD, two thin film libraries were deposited in this study. One is a thin film library of a PdCuSi alloy system, and the other is a MoZrPd system. The compositions and crystallinity of the samples were evaluated on the substrate using EDS and IP-XRD respectively. Analysis of the samples showed a graded composition, and some of the samples were shown to be amorphous in both libraries. INTRODUCTION Combinatorial arc plasma deposition (CAPD) has been developed as a new combinatorial thin film deposition process using arc plasma [1]. Combinatorial techniques are useful for searching for new materials because of their effectiveness in forming a large number of compositionally-graded samples and evaluating them with high throughput [2]. In combinatorial materials techniques, the fabrication of the compositionally-graded samples is important [3]. CAPD has three cathodic arc plasma guns (APGs) as the deposition source [4]. Pulse-like arc plasma from each APG cathode is guided onto a substrate by the magnetic field of a permanent magnet placed under the substrate. CAPD can thus control the deposition area by the magnetic field. The APGs shoot pulse-like plasma one by one at a specific time interval. Atoms from one APG are mixed with atoms from the other APGs forming a graded composition in the deposited thin film. The composition can be controlled with the number of plasma shots and their strengths. Thus, CAPD is capable of depositing compositionally-graded thin films by controlling the composition, the deposition area and/or the thin film thickness. Though the thin film is deposited on a substrate with a continuous graded composition, the substrate has a grid to separate the deposited thin film into more than 1,000 samples (called the thin
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