TY - GEN A1 - Kot, Małgorzata A1 - Łobaza, Justyna A1 - Naumann, Franziska A1 - Gargouri, Hassan A1 - Henkel, Karsten A1 - Schmeißer, Dieter T1 - Long-term ambient surface oxidation of titanium oxynitride films prepared by plasma-enhanced atomic layer deposition: An XPS study T2 - Journal of Vacuum Science and Technology A N2 - The surface oxidation of a titanium oxynitride (TiOxNy) film after long-time storage of 25 month in ambient conditions is investigated. The TiOxNy film is prepared by plasma-enhanced atomic layer deposition using etrakis(dimethylamino)titanium and nitrogen plasma, and the film is characterized by Ar+ ion sputtering of the film surface in combination with x-ray photoelectron spectroscopy (XPS) as well as by angle-resolved XPS. The total thickness of an oxygen-enriched layer at the surface of the TiOxNy films is found to be about 0.7 nm and it consists of a sequence of a 0.4 nm thick TiON/TiO2 enriched layer followed by a 0.3 nm thick TiO2 enriched layer underneath compared to the bulk composition of the film which shows constant values of 29% TiN, 29% TiO2, and 42% TiON. The results suggest that the TiON enrichment takes place initially at the surface followed by a surface and subsurface oxidation. KW - atomic layer deposition (ALD) KW - surface oxidation KW - X-Ray photoelectron spectroscopy (XPS) KW - titanium oxynitride Y1 - 2018 U6 - https://doi.org/10.1116/1.5003356 SN - 0734-2101 SN - 1520-8559 VL - 36 IS - 1 ER -