Short paper 726 © Copyright by International OCSCO World Press. All rights reserved. 2009 VOLUME 37 ISSUE 2 December 2009 of Achievements in Materials and Manufacturing Engineering of Achievements in Materials and Manufacturing Engineering DLC layers prepared by the PVD magnetron sputtering technique K.T. Wojciechowski a, *, R. Zybala a , R. Mania a , J. Morgiel b a AGH University of Science and Technology, Faculty of Materials Science and Ceramics, Department of Inorganic Chemistry, Al. Mickiewicza 30, 30-059 Kraków, Poland b Institute of Metallurgy and Materials Science of Polish Academy of Sciences, ul. Reymonta 25, 30-059 Kraków, Poland * Corresponding author: E-mail address: wojciech@uci.agh.edu.pl Received 14.09.2009; published in revised form 01.12.2009 Manufacturing and processing ABSTRACT Purpose: The aim of the present paper was to elaborate deposition conditions of the DLC films prepared by magnetron sputtering technique. Design/methodology/approach: DLC layers were fabricated by the reactive pulsed magnetron sputtering method in the mixture of Ar and methane (CH 4 ). The gas pressure during sputtering process ranged from 0.3 to 0.7 Pa. The DLC layers were deposited on selected thermoelectric, ceramic and metallic substrates. Microstructure of obtained DLC layers were characterised by TEM and SEM microscopy. Raman spectroscopy was also used to characterise the different forms of carbon in the films. Findings: Structural investigations showed amorphous character of the produced layers and the lack of presence of nano-crystalline diamond phase both in layers obtained at 35 °C and in higher temperatures. Raman spectroscopy studies confirmed the dominant share of sp2 hybridization in the C - C and the presence of C – H bonds. Obtained layers are characterized by high electrical resistivity. Practical implications: Microstructure and high resistivity of DLC layers, prepared by magnetron technique, give prospective of their applications e.g. in microelectronics. Originality/value: Microstructure and high resistivity of DLC layers, prepared by magnetron technique, give perspectives for their applications e.g. in microelectronics. Keywords: DLC; Raman spectroscopy; Magnetron sputtering Reference to this paper should be given in the following way: K.T. Wojciechowski, R. Zybala, R. Mania, J. Morgiel, DLC layers prepared by the PVD magnetron sputtering technique, Journal of Achievements in Materials and Manufacturing Engineering 37/2 (2009) 726-729. 1. Introduction The plasma assisted deposition of different carbon layers such as the diamond-like-carbon (DLC) [1, 2] polycrystalline diamond [3] or nano-crystalline [4, 5] diamond arouse a lot of interest since the end of the last century. The DLC layers interest in electronic industry guaranteed continuous dielectric hard coating of good thermal conductivity. On the other hand, the high bio- compatibility of carbon resulted in attempts to apply the DLC coatings on the parts of artificial heart [6, 7]. These two examples of faraway applications confirm the important place of these types of coatings. Most of the past research effort in this area was centered on elaboration of the best deposition conditions for a range of 1. Introduction