Atomic Layer Deposition of Thin VNx Film from Tetrakis(diethylamido)vanadium Precursor

Thin vanadium nitride (VN x ) films were grown by atomic layer deposition using tetrakis(diethylamido)vanadium as a precursor and NH 3 as a reactant. A growth rate of 0.1 nm/cycle without incubation time is obtained. Transmission electron microscopy reveals that a nanocrystalline texture in random orientation is characteristic of the VN x film, which is favorable as an extremely thin barrier application. A low carbon impurity level (${\sim}6$ at.%) is achieved owing to acceleration of the transamination between the V(NR 2 ) 4 precursor and NH 3 . The lowest resistivity of 120 μ$\Omega$ cm is successfully achieved for the VN x film prepared under optimized conditions.