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Medium-Range Order Structures of Amorphous Diamond-Like Carbon Films

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Abstract

In this paper, we have studied medium-range order structures in amorphous diamond-like carbon films with fluctuation microscopy. Medium-range order structures are quantified by a specific form of a general four-body correlation. We name this function as a pair-pair alignment correlation function. By analyzing speckle dark-field images taken over different areas as a function of momentum transfer in reciprocal space, we measured the pair-pair alignment correlation function for both thermally annealed samples and unannealed samples. We have found that thermal annealing introduces medium-range order in amorphous diamond-like carbon films, causing more pairs of atoms to be aligned. These results agree with density-functional simulations. Larger-scale simulations will be needed to fully understand our experimental results.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Materials Science Division, Argonne National Laboratory, Argonne, IL, 60439, USA

    Xidong Chen & J. Murray Gibson

  2. Nanostructure and Semiconductor Physics Department, Sandia National Laboratories, Albuquerque, NM, 87185-1421, USA

    John Sullivan & Tom Friedmann

Authors
  1. Xidong Chen
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  2. J. Murray Gibson
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  3. John Sullivan
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  4. Tom Friedmann
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Chen, X., Gibson, J.M., Sullivan, J. et al. Medium-Range Order Structures of Amorphous Diamond-Like Carbon Films. MRS Online Proceedings Library 675, 1211 (2001). https://doi.org/10.1557/PROC-675-W12.1.1

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1557/PROC-675-W12.1.1

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