Morphological stability and specific resistivity of sub-10 nm silicide films of Ni1-xPtx on Si substrate

This letter studies the morphological stability and specific resistivity of sub-10 nm silicide films of Ni, Ni0.95Pt0.05, and Ni0.9Pt0.1 formed on Si(100) substrate. When the deposited metal films are below 1 to 4 nm in thickness depending on the Pt content, the resultant silicide films tend to become epitaxially aligned to the Si substrate and hence exhibit an extraordinary morphological stability up to 800 degrees C. The presence of Pt in the silicides increases the film resistivity through alloy scattering, but alleviates, owing to a reduced electron mean free path, the frequently encountered sharp increase in resistivity in the sub-10 nm regime.