The charge transport properties of the a-TaN x nanodomains are evaluated with a C-AFM (d’Innova, Bruker). A Pt/see more Ir-coated tip (SCM-PIC) of conical shape with tip radius approximately 8 nm, GSK2126458 molecular weight spring constant 0.2 N/m, and resonant frequency 13 kHz is used as the top metal electrode, resulting in a 10-nm2 effective contact area. A strip of conductive silver paint bridges the metal–semiconductor-metal junction with the AFM circuit when the substrate is the metallic

Au, and it plays also the role of the bottom electrode in the case of the Si substrate. The simplified circuits of Pt/a-TaN x /Au and Pt/a-TaN x /Ag devices are illustrated in Figure 1a,b, respectively. The tip is kept on virtual ground, while a pre-selected bias voltage is applied between the tip and the sample to avoid anionic oxidation. A femto-gain amplifier, with a gain factor of 107 in the case of TaN x deposited on Au and 108 in the case of TaN x deposited on Si, is used to detect the low C-AFM signal. Figure 1 Simplified diagrams of C-AFM and devices. (a) The Pt/Ir-TaN x -Au device. (b) The Pt/Ir-TaN x -Ag device. Results and discussion Different morphological features of the a-TaN x films deposited on Au and Si are displayed by the AFM topological mapping. For the a-TaN x deposited on Au, the film consists of relative smooth round-shaped nanoislands with average surface

roughness of 48 nm and root of middle square (RMS) of 22 nm, as it is shown in Figure 2a,b. Whereas, for the a-TaN x deposited on Si, the film

consists of larger AZD2171 concentration nanoislands with average surface roughness of 248 nm and RMS of 68 nm, which are created by DOCK10 the agglomeration of smaller grains, as it is shown in Figure 2c,d. Because the deposition parameters of both films are the same except for the type of the substrate, the above results indicate that a-TaN x agglomeration is affected by the substrate [39]. Figure 2 Surface morphology of TaN x with AFM imaging. (a) AFM mapping of the TaN x film on Au substrate reveals smooth round-shaped nanoislands. (b) The corresponding histogram shows that the average roughness is 48 nm. (c) AFM mapping of the TaN x film on Si substrate reveals grainy nanoislands with high roughness consisting of smaller nanoparticles. (d) The distribution of the film’s roughness is shown with average of 248 nm. In Figure 3a, a typical FIB cross section of the TaN x thin film deposited on Si is shown. The darkest layer above the Si substrate corresponds to the TaN x layer with maximum thickness of the film to be around 140 nm. Amorphous, chain-like nanostructures in the TaN x film deposited on Si are identified by TEM, Figure 3b, and they are composed from the agglomeration of individual nanoparticles with 5-nm mean diameter, as the high-resolution transmission electron microscopy (HRTEM) image of Figure 3c illustrates.