Recent Progress in the Synthesis and Characterization of Amorphous and Crystalline Carbon Nitride Coatings

This review summarizes our most recent ndings in the structure and properties of amorphous and crystalline carbon nitride coatings, synthesized by reactive magnetron sputtering. By careful control of the plasma conditions via proper choice of process parameters such as substrate bias, target power and gas pressure, one can precisely control lm structure and properties. With this approach, we were able to produce amorphous carbon nitride lms with controlled hardness and surface roughness. In particular, we can synthesize ultrathin (1 nm thick) amorphous carbon nitride lms to be suÆciently dense and uniform that they provide adequate corrosion protection for hard disk applications. We demonstrated the strong correlation between ZrN(111) texture and hardness in CNx/ZrN superlattice coatings. Raman spectroscopy and near-edge x-ray absorption show the predominance of sp-bonded carbon in these superlattice coatings.