Effects of Boron Doping on the Properties of Ultrananocrystalline Diamond Films

Boron-doped ultrananocrystalline diamond (UNCD) films were fabricated on silicon substrates by microwave plasma chemical vapor deposition. UNCD films containing different concentrations of boron were prepared by using trimethylboron (B(CH3)3, TMB) as boron doping source and varying the amount of boron in the gas mixture from 0 ppm to 1000 ppm. The effects of boron doping on morphology, lattice parameter, phase composition, crystal size, and residual stress of UNCD films were investigated. No obvious change of the morphology was observed on doping with boron, and all the films had the UNCD crystal grains. Boron doping enhanced (111) growth. The preferred growth direction of the UNCD films was 〈110〉\documentclass[12pt]{minimal} \usepackage{amsmath} \usepackage{wasysym} \usepackage{amsfonts} \usepackage{amssymb} \usepackage{amsbsy} \usepackage{mathrsfs} \usepackage{upgreek} \setlength{\oddsidemargin}{-69pt} \begin{document}$$ \langle 110 \rangle $$\end{document}. Residual tensile stress was present in all the films, and increased with increasing the amount of boron in the gas mixture.