• Korean Journal of Chemical Engineering
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• v.35 no.12
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• pp.2474-2479
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• 2018

Plasma-enhanced atomic layer deposition (PEALD) is well-known for fabricating conformal and uniform films with a well-controlled thickness at the atomic level over any type of supporting substrate. We prepared nickel oxide (NiO) thin films via PEALD using bis(ethylcyclopentadienyl)-nickel ($Ni(EtCp)_2$) and $O_2$ plasma. To optimize the PEALD process, the effects of parameters such as the precursor pulsing time, purging time, $O_2$ plasma exposure time, and power were examined. The optimal PEALD process has a wide deposition-temperature range of $100-325^{\circ}C$ and a growth rate of $0.037{\pm}0.002nm$ per cycle. The NiO films deposited on a silicon substrate with a high aspect ratio exhibited excellent conformality and high linearity with respect to the number of PEALD cycles, without nucleation delay.