Synthesis of cubic boron nitride films with mean ion energies of a few eV

The lowest threshold energy of ion bombardment for cubic boron nitride (cBN) film deposition, which is prepared on positively biased Si (100) substrates from boron trifluoride gas in the high-density source region of inductively coupled plasma with mean ion impact energies from 45 down to a few eV or less, is presented. The findings have shown the existence of a way to deposit cBN films through quasistatic chemical processes under ultralow-energy ion impact.