Structural properties of nanometric HfN/VN superlattices

HfN and VN systems have broadly been used as protective hard and anticorrosive coatings. [HfN/VN]n multilayered were deposited on silicon substrates by two target-r.f. magnetron sputtering with alternatively changing the sputtering plasma composition between pure Hf and V elements under a reactive mixture Ar/N$_{2}$. HfN/VN bilayer period varied from nanometric range (15 nm) to higher nanometric range (600 nm) values. Structural, morphological and stoichiometric of the coatings were analyzed by high angle and low-angle X-ray diffraction, X-ray photo electron spectroscopy (XPS), secondary ion mass spectrometry (SIMS), atomic force microscopy (AFM) and cross sectional transmission electron microscopy (TEM). We determined multilayer period, $\Lambda $, and individual layer thicknesses. We found a cube-on-cube epitaxial growth structure with an epitaxial relationship between layers inside each columnar crystallite given by (111)[100]$_{HfN}$//(200)[100]$_{VN}$.