Study On Properties Of ZrO₂ Thin Films Deposited By Magnetron Sputtering

ZrO2 film is widely used in the field of optical thin film due to its high refractive index, wide transparent range of spectrum, low absorption, low scattering in the visible and near infrared wave band. In addition, it has a high laser damage threshold, usually used as one of the most important high-refractive index material. And, it always was designed to laser multilayer film to meet the various requirements laser field with the low refractive index material-SiO2to improve the laser output power and energy.Therefore, ZrO2 thin films have important research value for the field of laser processing, military defense, scientific research.ZrO2 films was obtained using various methods such as electron beam evaporation, chemical vapor deposition, sol-gel method and magnetron sputtering etc. ZrO2 film was deposited on K9 glass substrate by reaction magnetron sputtering method in this paper, refractive index and extinction coefficient of the film was considered as evaluation index and technological parameters was optimized by orthogonal test method. In the above conditions, the properties of thin film were perpared in different oxygen flow, target-substrate distance and target power. And then they were given analysis about optical properties, laser induced damage. XRD and XPS. The relationship among the oxygen flow. the target-substrate distance, the target power and the film properties was analysed.The results show that technological parameters is that Oxygen the flow rate of 22sccm. target distance of 18mm. sputtering power of 0.3 kw, argon flow of 65secm, sputtering time of 20min, sputtering pressure of 6×10-2 Pa, the base pressure of 5×10-3 Pa can obtain the refractive index of the film is from 2.1. the laser induced damage threshold of the film was 20.73J/cm2 And the results have good reproducibility. The analysis results of thin film crystal structure by XRD as follows:the deposited film without annealing was amorphous. Thin film composition analysis results by XPS in the optimal process parameters as follows:ratio of Zr:O atomic in thin films close to 1:2. the pure ZrO2 thin films were obtained.