When metal thin films deposited typically by sputtering is heated to sufficiently high temperature, thin films tend to disintegrate into individual isolated spherical particles, whose phenomenon is called thermal dewetting. If such metal films are exposed to plasma, however, the dewetting kinetics is enhanced dramatically. One possibility for enhanced dewetting kinetics is the ion bombardment on the film surface from plasma. The other possibility is the excess charge buildup on the film surface provided from plasma. If enhanced dewetting kinetics is due to charge buildup, it can provide an evidence for charge-enhanced kinetics, which has been suggested as a hypothesis to explain the evolution of void-free dense films in non-classical crystallization where the building block is charged nanoparticles. To clarify which is responsible for plasma enhanced dewetting, the dewetting behavior of 100 nm thick Sn films on silicon substrates with native oxide surface was compared between floating and grounded films in the inductively-coupled plasma environment. The dewetting kinetics on the floating film was much higher than that on the grounded film. These results indicate that the charge buildup is responsible for the plasma enhanced dewetting kinetics.

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等离子体对接地基板和浮动基板之间Sn膜去湿动力学的影响比较

当通常通过溅射沉积的金属薄膜被加热到足够高的温度时，薄膜倾向于崩解成单个的分离的球形颗粒，这种现象称为热去湿。但是，如果将这样的金属膜暴露于等离子体，则去湿动力学将大大提高。增强去湿润动力学的一种可能性是等离子体对膜表面的离子轰击。另一种可能性是由等离子体提供的在膜表面上过多的电荷积聚。如果提高的去湿润动力学是由于电荷积聚引起的，则可以为电荷增强的动力学提供证据，这被认为是一种假设，用以解释非经典结晶中无孔致密膜的演化，在该过程中，结构单元带电了纳米颗粒。为了弄清是哪个引起了等离子体增强的去湿，在电感耦合等离子体环境下，在浮膜和接地膜之间比较了具有自然氧化物表面的硅基板上100 nm厚的Sn膜的去湿行为。浮膜上的去湿动力学远高于接地膜上的去湿动力学。这些结果表明，电荷积累是等离子体增强的去湿动力学的原因。