Conformal Chemical Vapor Deposition of Metal Oxide Thin Films from N,N-Dimethyldiboranamide Precursors

The N, N dimethyldiboranamide (H3BNMe2BH3, DMDBA) ligand is used to synthesize dozens of different alkaline earth, transition metal and rare earth metal compounds that have sufficient volatility to serve as precursors for the growth of complex materials by chemical vapor deposition (CVD). In this work, we report the growth of MgO and TiO2, nitrogen doped TiO2 and rare earth doped oxides using water as a co-reactant at substrate temperatures as low as 225°C. In most of cases, due to their high vapor pressure, the growth takes place without the need of using any carrier gas. In presence of water, the impurity concentrations in the films are below the AES and RBS detection limits, indicating that the dmdba ligand is efficiently released from the growth surface to the gas phase.