Effects Of Orientation On Microstructure And Mechanical Properties Of Tin/Aln Superlattice Films

Superlattice structure can significantly improve the hardness of the films without damaging the toughness. However, in TiN/AlN superlattice structure, the thickness of metastable c-AlN has a certain limit, which limits the improvement of hardness. We adjusted the orientation of the entire superlattice films under the same deposition parameters and observed that AlN has a thicker coherent thickness in the < 110 >-oriented TiN/AlN superlattice film relative to the < 100 > orientation through HRTEM, and the superlattice film reached a higher hardness peak value (similar to 38.6GPa) at the same time. This work provides a new implementation method to improve the mechanical properties of superlattice films. (C) 2021 Acta Materialia Inc. Published by Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.