A Different Regime of SManostructured Diamond Film Growth

摘要

A different regime of diamond growth was found out in microwave plasma chemical vapor deposition by applying a different combination of growth conditions (pressure, microwave power, bias voltage, and bias current). This different regime of growth was identified by high-resolution transmission electron microscopy. In this regime, at lower bias current density (BCD), nanocrystals of diamond were confined in a form of nano-diamond rods 10-30 nm in diameter and several hundred nanometers long. More interestingly, at relatively high BCD, the film consists of a high packing density of even smaller size (2-5 nm) of diamond that generates enormous stress in thin film. Our finding of this different regime of growth offers the promise of exploring new properties of carbon materials.e