[Spectroscopic diagnoses of glow discharge plasma for the carbon nitride growth process]

Plasma diagnostics is performed during dc. glow discharge plasma-enhanced chemical vapor deposition (PECVD) on nitride thin films using optical emission spectra. Several molecular bands such as the second positive series of N2 transitions, the first negative series of N2+ and the CN, NH violet bands are identified. Variations of the emission intensities of N2(337.1 nm), N2+(391.4 nm) and CN(388.3 nm) are investigated as the function of the percentage of H2, discharge current and deposition pressure. The related excitation mechanism of the species emission is discussed. Experimental results show that adding a small amount of H2(about 5%) into the gas source will be beneficial to produce all the active species. Higher discharge current will result in an increase of the active species concentration while there is maximum emission intensity at medium gas pressure at about 4 kPa. The collisions between the species, including metastable nitrogen and hydrogen are related with the concentration variations of the measured species. All the results and discussion provide reference data for optimizing the deposition parameters and controlling the deposition process in the synthesis of carbon nitride thin films.