The effect of nitrogenation on the electrical properties of amorphous hydrogenated carbon layers

Abstract

The electrical properties of nitrogen-containing amorphous hydrogenated carbon layers are investigated. The nitrogen concentration was between 0 and 6 at%. The electrical conductivity is found to increase with the nitrogen content. The temperature dependent conductivity in the temperature range between 150 and 350 K can be well fitted by a semi-empirically derived equation which considers the conductivity as a superposition of two hopping mechanisms with different activation energies. Together with experimental results on the optical properties and the mass density, these data allowed to propose a structural model which explains the observed effects in terms of familiar a-C:H cluster models.