Influence of filament-to-substrate distance on the spectroscopic, structural and optical properties of silicon carbide thin films deposited by HWCVD technique

Silicon carbide (SiC) thin films were deposited using hot wire chemical vapor deposition (HWCVD) technique from pure silane and methane gas mixture. The effect of filament distance to the substrate on the structural and optical properties of the films was investigated. Fourier transform infrared (FTIR) spectroscopy, X-ray diffraction (XRD), Raman scattering spectroscopy and UV–Vis–NIR spectroscopy were carried out to characterize SiC films. XRD patterns of the films indicated that the film deposited under highest filament-to-substrate distance were amorphous in structure, while the decrease in distance led to formation and subsequent enhancement of crystallinity. The Si–C bond density in the film structure obtained from FTIR data, showed significant increment with transition from amorphous to nano-crystalline structure. However, it remained almost unchanged with further improvement in crystalline volume fraction. From Raman data it was observed that the presence of amorphous silicon phase and sp ² bonded carbon clusters increased with the decrease in distance. This reflected in deterioration of structural order and narrowing the optical band gap of SiC films. It was found that filament-to-substrate distance is a key parameter in HWCVD system which influences on the reactions kinetics as well as structural and optical properties of the deposited films.