Chien-Jen Tang, Feng Chia University, Taiwan
In optical coating area, efforts have been made to improve the performance of optical thin-film filters that are needed in optical and optoelectronic devices. These optical thin film filters have to be made by the alternate deposition of high and low refractive index materials. The standards that these filters must meet have also become stricter. Therefore, there are two important issues on optical coatings. First, we have to develop new and improved processes for deposition of thin film materials which were highly stable, mechanically strong, low absorption, and, last but not least, low cost. Second, we need to develop new methods to design optical multilayer coatings. Recently, HIPIMS has attracted considerable attention to the field of thin film sputtering, and it has been widely applied in variety of industrial sectors. The reactive HiPIMS process also has potential applications to optical coatings and to provide an alternative method to solve the above-mentioned issues.
In this presentation, we will discuss the optical and mechanical properties of high hardness aluminum nitride films prepared by reactive HiPIMS, superimposed HiPIMS-MF sputtering and plasma-assisted reactive HIPMS, and study on graded-index-like rugate filters prepared by reactive HiPIMS and DOMS process with PEM control.