What is it about?
Superconducting films - from just a few nanometers to hundreds - are integral to quantum devices. Plasma-enhanced atomic layer deposition (PEALD) is gaining momentum thanks to its accurate growth and composition control. In our work, we demonstrate high growth rates of 30 – 60 nm/hour for superconducting NbTiN using the PlasmaPro ASP system, along with material tunability through ion-energy control.
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Why is it important?
For the quantum field to more widely adopt PEALD and reach the full potential of this technique, more competitive growth rates are required than those demonstrated in literature until now. Especially for applications requiring thicker superconducting films in the ~100 nm range, typical PEALD rates present a bottleneck. In this article, we demonstrate a fast NbxTi1-xN PEALD process with substrate bias. The substrate bias has a notable influence on film properties, which could be interesting for various quantum applications. Superconducting NbxTi1-xN films were grown with accurate composition control and exceptionally high deposition rates of 30 – 60 nm/h. These results make fast PEALD with ion-energy control a strong candidate for future fabrication of a wide range of quantum devices.
Perspectives
Next to the valuable contributions of my co-authors, this work has been shaped by the many invigorating discussions with experts in materials and processing and in quantum fields. I hope this article motivates the reader to consider atomic layer deposition a technique applicable beyond the few nanometer realm - it has the potential to become an enabling technique in (superconducting) quantum device fabrication.
Silke Peeters
Technische Universiteit Eindhoven
Read the Original
This page is a summary of: Superconducting NbxTi1−xN prepared at high deposition rates with plasma-enhanced atomic layer deposition and substrate biasing, AVS Quantum Science, April 2025, American Vacuum Society,
DOI: 10.1116/5.0254908.
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