Study on crystalline to amorphous structure transition of Cr coatings by magnetron sputtering

The influence of deposition rate on crystalline to amorphous microstructure transition of Cr coatings was studied through preparation of Cr coatings deposited onto silicon wafers using magnetron sputtering technique. The microstructure and morphology of Cr coatings were characterized by scanning electron microscopy (SEM), X-ray diffraction (XRD) and transmission electron microscopy (TEM). Results show that Cr coating prepared at 400 W exhibits dense columnar crystalline structure and the crystallite size and crystallization rate are increased expressly in the initial 5 min. When the deposition rate achieved to the maximum, Cr coating shows a case of infinite periodic renucleation where new crystals are assumed to be nucleated periodically on the surfaces of growing crystals and strong persistence of the columnar growth morphology is apparent. However, Cr coating exhibits overall microstructure of amorphous phase mixed with a few nano-crystal grains as the deposition rate decreases to the minimum.