Nickel β-diketonate complexes as precursors for the photochemical deposition of nickel oxide thin films

In this paper we report the utilization of amorphous films of Ni(II) diketonate complexes as precursors for the direct photochemical deposition of thin films of nickel oxides. The UV photolysis of amorphous thin solid films of Ni(PhCOCHCOPr)2 results in the loss of all ligands from the coordination sphere. The acetylacetone derivative was chosen for the solid state photochemistry because the presence of the long carbon chains or highly branched hydrocarbons substituents, lowers the intermolecular interactions and allows the formation of high quality films upon spin-coating. The surface morphology of the films was observed by scanning electron microscopy and showed excellent quality without islands or other imperfections. The formation of NiO was determined by X-ray difraction and Auger spectroscopy analysis. The photochemical deposition of patterns of NiO was shown to be compatible with standard lithographic techniques by the lithography of 100 × 2 μm lines.