The effect of deposition times in DC‐magnetron sputtering on micromorphology of TiO2 thin films

• Published in: Microscopy research and technique Vol. 84; no. 7; pp. 1475 - 1483
• Main Author: Rezaee, Sahar
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: English
• Published: Hoboken, USA John Wiley & Sons, Inc 01.07.2021; Wiley Subscription Services, Inc
• Subjects: Algorithms; Atomic force microscopy; Deposition; Fractal analysis; Magnetron sputtering; Mountains; multifractal analysis; Photovoltaic cells; Segmentation; surface texture; Thin films; TiO2 thin films; Titanium dioxide
• ISSN: 1059-910X; 1097-0029; 1097-0029
• DOI: 10.1002/jemt.23703

TiO2 thin films have been prepared by DC‐magnetron sputtering process with various deposition times (8, 14, 16, and 20 min) and the micromorphology of their surface has been investigated by means of multifractal analysis. As the main purpose of the manuscript, the topography of all samples are examined by atomic force microscopy (AFM) through the Mountains Map® Premium software which characterizes motifs of significant peaks and pits through stereometric data by the watershed segmentation algorithm. In addition, multifractal features of samples provide deeper insight into texture characteristics and used as the supplementary of the results. ‐ TiO2 thin films were synthesized by DC‐magnetron sputtering technique. ‐ The correlation between surface micromorphology and varied deposition times has been established. ‐ The fractal features of TiO2 thin films are extracted from atomic force microscopy images.