Plasma sputtering of PbEuTe films with varied composition and structure.

We investigate the sputtering of single-crystal and polycrystalline films of PbEuTe ( x = 0.02-0.10) in high-frequency inductively coupled argon plasma. Layers of PbEuTe are grown via molecular beam epitaxy on barium-fluoride substrates of the (111) orientation at 340 and 200°C. For single-crystal films, the dependence of the sputtering rate on the europium concentration is found. For polycrystalline layers, a decrease in the sputtering rate is observed. This is caused by the effect of europium oxidation at the surface of the polycrystallites. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]