Controlling the surface energy and electrical properties of carbon films deposited using unbalanced facing target magnetron sputtering plasmas

Surface energy, being an important material parameter to control its interactions with the other surfaces plays a key role in bio-related application. Carbon films are found very promising due to their characteristics such as wear and corrosion resistant, high hardness, inert, low resistivity and biocompatibility. The present work deals with the deposition of carbon films using unbalanced facing target magnetron sputtering technique. The discharge characteristics were studied using optical emission spectroscopy and correlated with the film properties. Surface energy was investigated through contact angle measurement. The ID/IG ratio as calculated from Raman spectroscopy data increases with the increase in power density due to the higher number of sp2 clusters embedded in the amorphous matrix. The deposited films were smooth and homogeneous as observed by Atomic force microscopy having RMS roughness in the range of 1.74 to 2.25 nm. It is observed that electrical resistivity and surface energy varies in direct proportionality with operating pressure and has inverse relation with power density. The surface energy results clearly exhibited that these films can have promising applications in cell cultivation.