Effect of Vacuum System Base Pressure on Corrosion Resistance of Sputtered Al Thin Films

Pure aluminum (Al) thin films were sputter deposited under conditions of variable base pressure of the deposition tool. The purpose of the study was to identify if the base pressure had a key influence on the electrochemical properties, namely corrosion resistance, of the Al deposits. The corrosion resistance was found to increase with increasingly high base pressure (i.e. lower quality vacuum). Potentiodynamic polarization experiments, pit growth studies, TEM and XPS were employed. From the results is posited that improved corrosion resistance is due to the presence of oxygen (O) being incorporated into the films during deposition resulting an O-containing (i.e. Al-O) alloy. This effect is important to identify because of the many reports in the literature of high pitting potentials for Al thin films, from studies with widely varying base pressure. Vacuum system base pressure was found to have a large effect on the corrosion resistance. A maximum base pressure in the low 10(-7) Ton range is recommended to minimize oxygen uptake into the film. (C) 2014 The Electrochemical Society. All rights reserved.