Deformation structures under indentations in TiN/NbN single-crystal multilayers deposited by magnetron sputtering at different bombarding ion energies

Work elsewhere has suggested that multilayer films with layer thicknesses of a few nanometres can be much harder than monolithic films, although there is considerable variation in the observed magnitude of this effect. To investigate this, multilayer TiN/NbN films have been deposited by reactive magnetron sputtering on to MgO single crystals. The hardnesses measured were similar to those of the TiN and NbN alone, which is consistent with the observation by transmission electron microscopy (TEM) that deformation across the interfaces was not prevented. Varying the electrical potential at which the film was grown from -10 to -200V and the corresponding ion energy from 10 to 200eV increased the hardness from 19 to 25GPa; further decreases in the potential caused the hardness to decrease. Using TEM, deformation was observed to occur along the apparent columnar boundaries within the films, suggesting that the effect of the electrical potential on the measured hardness was caused by changes in the apparent strength of the columnar boundaries, possibly associated with the variations in the volume fraction of voids that were observed on these boundaries.