Structure and Oriented Growth of CoCr Films With Amorphous Ti Underlayer

CoCr films with and without amorphous Ti underlayers were deposited by rf magnetron sputtering. We studied the growth characteristics and the dispersion of crystallographic orientation of CoCr films over a thickness range from 20 to 600nm. A 20nm-thick CoCr film with Ti underlayer possesses hcp structure and its c-axis is normal to the film plane. However, the CoCr flim without Ti underlayer is amorphous. Whether their structure are amorphous or hcp texture, the Ti underlayers always promote preferred orientation of CoCr films at the early growth stage.