Annealing Effects of Iron Nitride Thin Film Grown by Plasma-Assisted Evaporation Technique

Fe-N films were synthesised by a plasma-assisted doposition technique and annealing effects were investigated. X-ray diffraction (XRD) showed that the as-deposited films consist of the Fe x N (2≤x≤3) mixed phases. After annealing the as-deposited film at 500°C, the saturation magnetization increased to 2.5 Wb/m 2 which is larger than that of pure Fe (4πM s -2.1 Wb/m 2 ). The XRD patterns of the film annealed at 500°C indicated the existence of Fe 4 N and Fe or Fe 16 N 2 phases where the diffraction patterns of Fe and Fe 16 N 2 could not be distinguished from each other, however, the diffraction patterns obtained by transmission electron microscopy (TEM) confirm the formation of Fe 16 N 2 phase in the film.