Organophosphonates have been used as simulants of highly toxic compounds such as chemical warfare agents in the study of the decomposition reactions that occur on the surface of hafnium dioxide. Metal oxide and metal-oxide nanoparticles have been shown to decompose organophosphonate molecules. In this study, high surface area hafnium oxide nanoparticles are synthesized via laser ablation. This creates nanoparticles that are free of contaminants and have a narrow size distribution. The particles are characterized by atomic force microscopy and scanning electron microscopy to determine particle size and thin film morphology. Once characterized, they are exposed to dimethyl methylphosphonate and the surface reaction is analyzed by reflection-absorption infrared spectroscopy. / Master of Science

This dissertation includes two parts. In the first part the study is focused on the fabrication of multifunctional thin films for photovoltaic applications. There is no doubt about the importance of transforming world reliance from traditional energy resources, mainly fossil fuel, into renewable energies. Photovoltaic section still owns very small portion of the production, despite its fast growth and vast research investments. New methods and concepts are proposed in order to improve the efficiency of traditional solar cells or introduce new platforms. Recently, ferroelectric photovoltaics have gained interest among researchers. First objective in application of ferroelectric material is to utilize its large electric field as a replacement for or improvement of built-in electric field in semiconductor p-n junctions which is responsible for the separation of generated electron-hole pairs. Increase in built in electric field will increase open-circuit voltage of the solar cell. In this regard, thin films of ferroelectric hafnium dioxide doped with silicon have been fabricated using physical vapor deposition techniques. Scanning probe microscopy techniques (PFM and KPFM) have been employed to analyze ferroelectric response and surface potential of the sample. The effects of poling direction of the ferroelectric film on the surface potential and current-voltage characteristics of the cell have been investigated. The results showed that the direction of poling affects photoresponse of the cell and based on the direction it can either improved or diminished. In the second part of this work, epitaxial thin films have been synthesized with physical vapor deposition techniques such as sputtering and electron beam evaporation for the ultimate goal of producing multifunctional three-dimensional structures. Three-dimensional structures have been used for applications such as magnetic sensors, filters, micro-robots and can be used for modification of the surface of solar cells in order to improve light absorption and efficiency. One of the important techniques for producing 3-D structures is using origami techniques. The effectiveness of this technique depends on the control of parameters which define direction of bending and rolling of the film or curvature of the structure based on the residual stress in the structure after film’s release and on the quality and uniformity of the film. In epitaxially grown films, the magnitude and direction of the stress are optimized, so the control over direction of rolling or bending of the film can be controlled more accurately. For this purpose, deposition conditions for epitaxy of Zn, Fe, Ru, Ti, NaCl and Cr on Si, Al2O3 or MgO substrates have been investigated and optimized. Crystallinity, composition and morphology of the films were characterized using reflective high energy diffraction (RHEED), Auger electron spectroscopy (AES), energy dispersive X-ray (EDX), and scanning electron microscopy (SEM).

HfO2 is a popular replacement for SiO2 in modern CMOS technology. It is used as the gate dielectric layer isolating the transistor channel from the gate. For this application, certain material property demands need to be met, most importantly, a high static dielectric constant is desirable as this positively influences the effectiveness and reliability of the device. Previous theoretical calculations have found that this property varies with the crystal structure of HfO2; specifically, the tetragonal structure possesses the highest dielectric constant (~70 from theoretical calculations) out of all possible stable structures at atmospheric pressure, with the cubic phase a far second (~29, also calculated). Following the results from previous experimental work on the phase formation of sputtered HfO2, this study investigates the possibility of producing thin films of HfO2 with the cubic or tetragonal structure by the addition of nitrogen to a reactive sputtering process at various deposition temperatures. Also, a new physical vapor deposition method known as High Power Impulse Magnetron Sputtering (HiPIMS) is employed for its reported deposition stability in the transition zone of metal-oxide compounds and increased deposition rate. Structural characterization of the produced films shows that films deposited at room temperature with a low N content (~6 at%) are mainly composed of amorphous HfO2 with mixed crystallization into t-HfO2 and c-HfO2, while pure HfO2 is found to be composed of amorphous HfO2 with signs of crystallization into m-HfO2. At 400o C deposition temperature, the crystalline quality is enhanced and the structure of N incorporated HfO2 is found to be c-HfO2 only, due to further ordering of atoms in the crystal lattice. Optical and dielectric characterization revealed films with low N incorporation (< 6 at%) to be insulating while these became conductive for higher N contents. For the insulating films, a trend of increasing static dielectric constant with increasing N incorporation is found.

Neste trabalho foi realizada a investigação de interações hiperfinas em amostra nano estruturadas e filmes finos de dióxido de háfnio por meio da técnica de correlação angular gama-gama perturbada (CAP), com o intuito de realizar um estudo sistemático do comportamento dos parâmetros quadrupolares com a temperatura de tratamento térmico. Para a realização destas medidas foi utilizada a ponta de prova 181Hf -> 181Ta que foi produzida na própria amostra por irradiação, no reator IEA-R1 do IPEN. As amostras foram obtidas através do processo químico sol-gel e as análises dos compostos realizadas por difração de raios-X, EDS e MEV. As amostras em forma de pó foram todas produzidas pelo Laboratório de Interações Hiperfinas do IPEN, no entanto o filme fino com espessura de 10nm foi produzido pelo Centro de Lasers e Aplicações (CLA) do IPEN e o filme fino de espessura de 409nm foi produzido pelo Laboratório de Interações Hiperfinas da Universidade de Lisboa. As medidas foram realizadas todas à temperatura ambiente e os resultados mostraram que a fase monoclínica encontra-se presente em todas as amostras e sua fração tende a aumentar sempre com o aumento da temperatura de tratamento térmico na qual foram submetidas às amostras. A impurificação de algumas amostras com elementos Co e Fe foi realizada com a intenção de se observar o comportamento da amostra em função da temperatura de tratamento térmico e também verificar a existência de ferromagnetismo à temperatura ambiente. / Hyperfine interactions in the powder samples and nanostructured thin films of hafnium dioxide have been studied through the perturbed angular correlation (PAC) technique in order to perform a systematic study of the behavior of quadrupole parameters with the annealing temperature. The PAC measurements were performed with the 181Hf -> 181Ta probe. The probe was produced by the neutron irradiation in the IEA-R1 nuclear reactor of IPEN. Samples were prepared using sol-gel chemical process. The samples were analyzed by X-ray diffraction, SEM and EDS. The powder samples were all produced in the Laboratory of Hyperfine Interactions of IPEN, however the thin film with a thickness of 10nm was produced by the Lasers and Applications Center (CLA) of IPEN and the thin film of a thickness of 409nm were produced by the Hyperfine Interactions Laboratory of the Lisbon University. All the measurements were perform at room temperature and showed that the monoclinic phase is present in all the samples and their fraction tends to increase with increasing annealing temperature to which the samples were submitted. Some of the samples were doped with 3d elements Co and Fe in order to observe the possible existence of ferromagnetism at room temperature.

Neste trabalho foi realizada a investigação de interações hiperfinas em amostra nano estruturadas e filmes finos de dióxido de háfnio por meio da técnica de correlação angular gama-gama perturbada (CAP), com o intuito de realizar um estudo sistemático do comportamento dos parâmetros quadrupolares com a temperatura de tratamento térmico. Para a realização destas medidas foi utilizada a ponta de prova 181Hf -> 181Ta que foi produzida na própria amostra por irradiação, no reator IEA-R1 do IPEN. As amostras foram obtidas através do processo químico sol-gel e as análises dos compostos realizadas por difração de raios-X, EDS e MEV. As amostras em forma de pó foram todas produzidas pelo Laboratório de Interações Hiperfinas do IPEN, no entanto o filme fino com espessura de 10nm foi produzido pelo Centro de Lasers e Aplicações (CLA) do IPEN e o filme fino de espessura de 409nm foi produzido pelo Laboratório de Interações Hiperfinas da Universidade de Lisboa. As medidas foram realizadas todas à temperatura ambiente e os resultados mostraram que a fase monoclínica encontra-se presente em todas as amostras e sua fração tende a aumentar sempre com o aumento da temperatura de tratamento térmico na qual foram submetidas às amostras. A impurificação de algumas amostras com elementos Co e Fe foi realizada com a intenção de se observar o comportamento da amostra em função da temperatura de tratamento térmico e também verificar a existência de ferromagnetismo à temperatura ambiente. / Hyperfine interactions in the powder samples and nanostructured thin films of hafnium dioxide have been studied through the perturbed angular correlation (PAC) technique in order to perform a systematic study of the behavior of quadrupole parameters with the annealing temperature. The PAC measurements were performed with the 181Hf -> 181Ta probe. The probe was produced by the neutron irradiation in the IEA-R1 nuclear reactor of IPEN. Samples were prepared using sol-gel chemical process. The samples were analyzed by X-ray diffraction, SEM and EDS. The powder samples were all produced in the Laboratory of Hyperfine Interactions of IPEN, however the thin film with a thickness of 10nm was produced by the Lasers and Applications Center (CLA) of IPEN and the thin film of a thickness of 409nm were produced by the Hyperfine Interactions Laboratory of the Lisbon University. All the measurements were perform at room temperature and showed that the monoclinic phase is present in all the samples and their fraction tends to increase with increasing annealing temperature to which the samples were submitted. Some of the samples were doped with 3d elements Co and Fe in order to observe the possible existence of ferromagnetism at room temperature.

The scaling down of Complementary Metal Oxide Semiconductor (CMOS) transistors to sub-100nm requires replacement of conventional Silicon dioxide layer with high dielectric constant (K) material for gate dielectric. Among the various high-K dielectrics that have been studied, HfO2 is found to be a promising candidate because of its high dielectric constant (~25), large band gap (5.68 eV), thermodynamic stability and good interface with Si. The HfO2 films have already been deposited using different growth techniques such as Atomic layer Deposition (ALD), Metalorgonic Chemical Vapor Deposition (MOCVD) and Pulsed Laser Deposition (PLD). Ion Assisted Deposition (IAD) is a novel technique that has been successfully employed to produce optical coatings of required quality. This growth technique presents many advantages over the other techniques such as formation from solid oxide sources, low growth temperatures (25-3000C) and film densification by ion bombardment. Hence this technique has been used to prepare HfO2 films in the present investigations. This thesis presents the structural, optical and electrical properties of HfO2 thin films prepared by Ion assisted deposition (IAD). The suitability of Ion assisted deposition process and the importance of investigations on the influence of process parameters on the film characteristics have been brought out in the process parameters-structure-composition and properties correlation presented in this thesis. The aim of this work is to process and characterize HfO2 films and investigate the influence of process parameters on the structure, composition and properties of the films to identify their suitability for CMOS gate applications. HfO2 films were deposited on p-type Si (100) wafers by Ion assisted deposition in an electron beam evaporation (Leybold,L-560) system. Pre-bombardment of the substrates with Argon ions has been done to remove any native oxide layer formation on Silicon by using a hallow cathode ion source (DENTON VACUUM CC103). During the film deposition a collimated oxygen ion beam, generated from the ion source is directed towards the substrate. The oxygen ion current is controlled by adjusting the voltage applied to the ion source and the oxygen flow through the ion source. The oxygen ions bombard the film as it grows and in that process improves its packing density as well as its stoichiometry. Keeping the deposition rate and thickness constant, HfO2 films have been deposited by varying Ion Current, Ion energy and substrate temperature. MOS capacitors were fabricated with Aluminum as gate electrode deposited by thermal evaporation. Ellipsometry techniques have been used to measure the optical thickness of the films. The interfacial layer (IL) formed at the HfO2/ Si interface was investigated by using Fourier transform Infrared spectroscopy (FT-IR). The structural characterization was carried out by X-ray diffraction technique. The high frequency capacitance-voltage and DC leakage current characteristics were measured to analyze the electrical characteristics of MOS capacitors. The effect of post deposition annealing (PDA) of the films at 600°C and 700ºC in Forming Gas (15%H2+85%N2) ambient and Post metallization annealing (PMA) at 400ºC in the same ambient was also investigated to observe the changes in electrical characteristics. The initial step of this work was to compare the characteristics of the films deposited by reactive evaporation and Ion assisted deposition which confirmed the superiority of the quality of IAD coatings and justified the need to proceed further with a more detailed study on the influence of various parameters on the properties of IAD coatings. HfO2 films deposited on substrates maintained at 1000C exhibited better structural, Optical and Electrical properties. The leakage current in these films were lower which has been attributed to silicate free interface as confirmed by XRD studies. Investigations on films deposited with oxygen ion beams of different currents in the range 20 to 40mA indicated that the films deposited at 20mA ion current showed better electrical properties. Better stoichiometry of these films as indicated by FT IR studies was one of the reasons for their improved performance. Annealing of these films at 6000C and 7000C in FGA medium resulted in creation of silicates and silicides at the interface thereby increasing the leakage currents and degraded the film properties. The films deposited with oxygen ion beams generated with a driving voltage 265V showed better structural and optical properties with silicate free interface compared with low and high driving voltages. Among all the films, the maximum dielectric constant of about 21.9 with a minimum EOT of 5.5 nm corresponding to a film deposited at ion current 20mA with PMA 400°C in FG ambient for 20minites is achieved. The lowest value of interface charge density achieved is 2.7 x1012 per cm-2 eV-1 corresponding to the sample deposited at substrate temperature 100°C with deposition rate of 0.5Å/sec followed by post metallization annealing at 400°C in forming gas for 20minutes. The range of Dit values that were obtained are varying from 2.7x 1012 – 16.7x1012 cm-2eV-1.It was also found that, the samples deposited at higher ion currents show lower Dit values than the samples deposited at lower ion currents. From the I−V analysis, the leakage current density is found to be comparatively less in IAD than in reactive evaporation. Leakage current increases with increase in substrate temperature and the same trend is observed with annealed films also. The lowest leakage current density of 1.05x10–8 A/cm2 at a gate bias of 1V was observed in the films deposited at substrate temperature 1000C. The present thesis focused on the suitability of the Ion Assisted deposition process for the preparation of HfO2 films for high-K gate dielectric application and the importance of investigations on the influence of process parameters on the film characteristics.

Im Fokus der vorliegenden Arbeit liegt das Widerstandsschalten von HfO2- und TiO2-Dünnschichten, wobei insbesondere auf den Einfluss der Kristallstruktur, der Stöchiometrie und der Elektrodenmaterialien ((inert, Pt) und (reaktiv, Ti/Pt)) eingegangen wurde. Die HfO2-Dünnschichten wurden mittels Atomlagenabscheidung (ALD) durch die Reaktion von Tetrakis(dimethylamido)hafnium mit Wasser bei Temperaturen von 100°C bis 350°C abgeschieden. Das beste ALD-Wachstum mit der geringsten Konzentration an Wasserstoff wurde für eine Temperatur von 300°C erhalten. Sowohl eine geringere als auch eine höhere Abscheidetemperatur führte durch parasitäre CVD-artige Prozesse bzw. durch die ungewollte thermische Zersetzung des Präkursors zu einer größeren Wasserstoffkonzentration. Des Weiteren wurde eine Korrelation zwischen der Wachstumsrate pro Zyklus, der Schichtdickenhomogenität und der Wasserstoffkonzentration in den HfO2-Schichten festgestellt. Das Widerstandsschalten wurde an amorphen (150°C) und polykristallinen (300°C) HfO2-Schichten mit unstrukturierten Rückelektroden und kreisförmigen Vorderseitenelektroden untersucht. Die Verwendung von symmetrischen Pt-Pt-Elektroden führte bei beiden Schichttypen zum unipolaren Schaltmodus. Der unipolare Schaltmodus wurde ebenfalls bei Verwendung von asymmetrischen Pt-Ti/Pt-Elektroden im Zusammenspiel mit der amorphen HfO2-Phase beobachtet. Eine Ausnahme stellt die Kombination von asymmetrischen Elektroden mit der polykristallinen HfO2-Phase dar. Dabei wurde nach der Elektroformierung mit positiv angelegter Spannung an die Vorderseitenelektrode der bipolare Schaltmodus erhalten. Eine Erklärung dafür liefert die Betrachtung der Filament-Wachstumsrichtung während der Elektroformierung. Die TiO2-Dünnschichten wurden durch reaktives Magnetronsputtern gewachsen. Die Stöchiometrie dieser Schichten wurde durch die Bestrahlung mit Ar-Ionen gezielt verändert. Dabei führt das bevorzugte Herausschlagen von Sauerstoff im Vergleich zum Titan zu einer an Sauerstoff verarmten TiOx-Schicht, welche sich durch die verwendete Ionenenergie von 2keV in oberflächennahen Bereichen befindet. Die Ausdehnung der TiOx-Schicht wurde mit einer TRIDYN-Simulation auf ca. 4nm bestimmt. Während sich zwischen einer TiO2-Schicht und einer Pt-Elektrode ein Schottky-Kontakt ausbildet, führt das Einbringen einer TiOx-Schicht zu einem ohmschen Kontakt. Für die Charakterisierung des Widerstandsschaltens an den mit Ar-Ionen bestrahlten TiO2-Schichten wurde somit auf symmetrische Pt-Pt-Elektroden zurückgegriffen. Im Bereich der getesteten Fluenzen von 1 x 10^13 Ar+/cm2 bis 1 x 10^16 Ar+/cm2 wurde mit einer Fluenz von 1 x 10^14 Ar+/cm2 sowohl die beste Ausbeute als auch die größten Endurance-Werte erzielt. / The work focuses on the resistive switching of HfO2 and TiO2 thin films. Especially the influence of crystal structure, stoichiometry and electrode materials ((inert, Pt) and (reactive, Ti/Pt)) have been examined. HfO2 thin films have been grown at temperatures ranging from 100°C to 350°C through the process of atomic layer deposition (ALD) by the reaction of tetrakis(dimethylamido)-hafnium with water. The best ALD growth with the lowest concentration of hydrogen was achieved at a temperature of 300°C. Both lower and higher deposition temperatures caused higher hydrogen concentrations due to parasitic CVD-like processes or thermal decomposition of the precursor. Moreover a correlation between the growth rate per cycle, the layer thickness uniformity and the hydrogen concentration in the HfO2 films was observed. Resistive switching was examined in amorphous (150°C) and polycrystalline (300°C) HfO2 films with unstructured bottom electrodes and circular structured top electrodes. The use of symmetric Pt-Pt-electrodes caused the unipolar switching mode in both layer types. The unipolar switching mode was also observed when asymmetric Pt-Ti/Pt-electrodes were used with an amorphous phase of the HfO2 layer. An exception is the use of asymmetric electrodes with the polycrystalline phase of the HfO2 layer. In this case electroforming with the application of positive voltage to the top electrode resulted in the bipolar switching mode. This is explained when looking at the filament growth direction during electroforming. TiO2 thin films were grown by reactive magnetron sputtering. The stoichiometry of these layers was modified by irradiation with Ar-ions. The preferential sputtering of oxygen compared to titanium causes a surface-near oxygen deficient TiOx layer due to the used ion energy of 2 keV. The depth of the TiOx layer was estimated to be 4 nm by using a TRIDYN simulation. While a Schottky contact formed between a TiO2 layer and a Pt-electrode, the use of a TiOx layer led to an ohmic contact. Symmetric Pt-Pt-electrodes were used to characterize resistive switching of TiO2 layers which have been irradiated with Ar-ions. The tested fluences ranged from 1×10^13 Ar+/cm2 to 1 × 10^16 Ar+/cm2. A fluence of 1 × 10^14 Ar+/cm2 resulted in the best yield and highest endurance.

Recently, high-κ materials have become the focus of research and been extensively utilized as the gate dielectric layer in aggressive scaled complementary metal-oxide-semiconductor (CMOS) technology. Hafnium dioxide (HfO2) is the most promising high-κ material because of its excellent chemical, thermal, mechanical and dielectric properties and also possesses good thermodynamic stability and better band offsets with silicon. Hence, HfO2 has already been used as gate dielectric in modern CMOS devices. For future technologies, it is very difficult to scale the silicon transistor gate length, so it is a necessary requirement of replacing the channel material from silicon to some high mobility material. Two-dimensional layered materials such as graphene and molybdenum disulfide (MoS2) are potential candidates to replace silicon. Due to its planar structure and atomically thin nature, they suit well with the conventional MOSFET technology and are very stable mechanically as well as chemically. HfO2 plays a vital role as a gate dielectric, not only in silicon CMOS technology but also in future nano-electronic devices such as graphene/MoS2 based devices, since high-κ media is expected to screen the charged impurities located in the vicinity of channel material, which results in enhancement of carrier mobility. So, for sustenance and enhancement of new technology, extensive study of the functional materials and its processing is required. In the present work, optimization of HfO2 thin films for gate dielectric applications in Nano-electronic devices using electron beam evaporation is discussed. HfO2 thin films have been optimized in two different thickness regimes, (i) about 35 nm physical thicknesses for back gate oxide graphene/MoS2 transistors and (ii) about 5 nm physical thickness to get Equivalent Oxide Thickness (EOT) less than 1 nm for top gate applications. Optical, chemical, compositional, structural and electrical characterizations of these films have been done using Ellipsometry, X-ray Photoelectron Spectroscopy (XPS), Rutherford Back Scattering (RBS), X-ray Diffraction (XRD), Capacitance-Voltage and Current-Voltage characterization techniques. The amount of O2 flow rate, during evaporation is optimized for 35 nm thick HfO2 films, to achieve the best optical, chemical and electrical properties. It has been observed that with increasing oxygen flow rate, thickness of the films increased and refractive index decreased due to increase in porosity resulting from the scattering of the evaporant. The films deposited at low O2 flow rates (1 and 3 SCCM) show better optical and compositional properties. The effects of post deposition annealing (PDA) and post metallization annealing (PMA) in forming gas ambient (FGA) on the optical and electrical properties of the films have been analyzed. The film deposited at 3 SCCM O2 flow rate shows the best properties as measured on MOS capacitors. A high density film (ρ=8.2 gram/cm3, 85% of bulk density) with high dielectric constant of κ=19 and leakage current density of J=2.0×10-6 A/cm2 at -1 MV/cm has been achieved at optimized deposition conditions. Bilayer graphene on HfO2/Si substrate has been successfully identified and also transistor has been fabricated with HfO2 (35 nm) as a back gate. High transconductance compared to other back gated devices such as SiO2/Si and Al2O3/Si and high mobility have been achieved. The performance of back gated bilayer graphene transistors on HfO2 films deposited at two O2 flow rates of 3 SCCM and 20 SCCM has been evaluated. It is found that the device on the film deposited at 3 SCCM O2 flow rate shows better properties. This suggests that an optimum oxygen pressure is necessary to get good quality films for high performance devices. MoS2 layers on the optimized HfO2/Si substrate have been successfully identified and transistor has been fabricated with HfO2 (32 nm) as a back gate. The device is switching at lower voltages compared to SiO2 back gated devices with high ION/IOFF ratio (>106). The effect of film thickness on optical, structural, compositional and electrical properties for top gate applications has been studied. Also the effect of gate electrode material and its processing on electrical properties of MOS capacitors have been studied. EOT of 1.2 nm with leakage current density of 1×10-4 A/cm2 at -1V has been achieved.