An XPS study of Au alloyed Al–O sputtered coatings

• Autor(a) principal: Figueiredo, N. M.
• Data de Publicação: 2011
• Outros Autores: Carvalho, N. J. M., Cavaleiro, A.
• Tipo de documento: Artigo
• Idioma: eng
• Título da fonte: Repositório Científico de Acesso Aberto de Portugal (Repositórios Cientìficos)
• Texto Completo: http://hdl.handle.net/10316/20043; https://doi.org/10.1016/j.apsusc.2011.01.104
• topic: XPS; Al2O3–Au; Au clusters; Alumina; Charging effect

The focus of this research is the X-ray photoelectron spectroscopy (XPS) analysis of thin films consisting of Au metal clusters embedded in a dielectric matrix of Al-O coatings. The coatings were deposited by co-sputtering an Al+Au target in a reactive atmosphere with Au contents up to 8 at.%. The Al-O matrix was kept amorphous even after annealing at 1000°C. In the as-deposited films the presence of Au clusters with sizes smaller than 1-2 nm (not detected by XRD) was demonstrated by XPS. With increasing annealing temperature, Au clustering in the dielectric matrix was also confirmed by XPS, in agreement with XRD results.