The influence of experimental procedures on the structural and magnetic properties of RF sputtered Fe–N thin films

Abstract Fe–N thin films were fabricated on Si (1 0 0) by RF magnetron sputtering. The dependence of the structural and magnetic properties with varied nitrogen partial pressure ( P N 2 ) , RF power and film thickness were systematically studied. The phase evolution from α-Fe(N) to ξ-Fe 2 N with increase of nitrogen partial pressure was seen. α″-Fe 16 N 2 existed in the whole range of the nitrogen partial pressure. The research of in-plane magnetic anisotropy with different nitrogen partial pressure indicated that interstitial nitrogen atoms affected in-plane magnetic anisotropy in Fe–N system. With the increase of the film thickness from 50 to 730 nm, the saturated magnetization ( M s ) decreases and the coercive force ( H c ) increases. The good soft magnetic properties with M s of 2223 emu/cm 3 and H c of 4 Oe were obtained at the optimized parameters of P N 2 , RF power and film thickness.