A 48 month PhD student position is open in the group of Dr. Michael Nolan at Tyndall National Institute at University College, Cork  to work on the newly funded Science Foundation Ireland – National Science Foundation of China research project NITRALD.

This project involves the modelling, deposition and characterisation of bilayer metal/metal-nitride and single-layer ternary nitride films which can function as barrier/liner materials in nanoscale interconnects. We aim to model and thus advance the understanding of nitrogen based plasma deposition and use this information to optimise the growth of these films at the partner lab in Fudan, China. This is an important activity for nanoscale electronics as the bottleneck will be the interconnect scaling rather than transistor performance.

Responsibilities

• The successful candidate will use large-scale DFT calculations, based on previous work from the group to examine the surface chemistry in the metal pulse and the nitrogen plasma pulse for nitride ALD. There is a dearth of detailed simulations of noble metal ALD and some transition metals, while there are no simulations in the literature of NHx-plasma chemistry in ALD. Thus, there is ample scope to develop new models for ALD growth of metal nitrides and inform experimental work at the Chinese partner. The candidate will also build on ongoing work in the group on modelling oxygen plasma growth. There are also questions about the different behaviour of N2/H2-plasma compared to NH3-plasma, which can also be explored. We aim to derive simple rules for the chemistry that can be used as descriptors to guide process parameters.
• The candidate will also work on modelling of nitride materials, which are less explored than, e.g. metal oxides, particularly focussing on surface chemistry. Activities here include building surface models and applying ab initio thermodynamics to the wide range of ligand-covered and amine-covered surfaces that may exist during a ternary ALD process and determining stabilities and deriving surface phase diagrams under ALD conditions. Making use of known or computed bulk phase diagrams, e.g. through data mining or high throughput screening will be used to inform the choice of ternary nitrides for experimental work. The catalytic behaviour of nitride surfaces can also be investigated.
• Further work includes extending previous studies to explain how the stoichiometry of ternaries depends on pulse sequence in an ALD supercycle. In a ternary M1M2Nx, subcycles for M1 are combined with those for M2 and one can vary the ratio of metal pulses in the supercycle, e.g. M1, M1, M2 etc. We want to explore how the stoichiometry ratio M1:M2 in the resulting film relates to the pulse ratio of M1 and M2 The charge on the metal and the stability of the precursors can be important in determining the final stoichiometry and this will be explored.
• The candidate will work with two Postdoctoral Researchers on these two topics and will be expected to undertake a range of technical and non-technical transferrable skills training as offered by Tyndall, UCC and externally. 

Essential Criteria

• BSc or MSc in Chemistry, Physics or Materials, with a minimum grade of Second Class Honour Grade 1 (or equivalent)
• Demonstrated fluency in English (IELTS or equivalent)
• Background in Chemistry, Materials or Physics.
• Experience in computing (LINUX/UNIX) and theoretical/computational chemistry.

Desirable Criteria

• Background in physical chemistry, chemical physics, condensed matter physics.
• Familiarity with UNIX/LINUX computing
• Familiarity with theoretical/computational chemistry, solid state physics/chemistry

For informal enquiries and to register your interest in this position, please contact Dr. Michael Nolan, [email protected]

Apply here: https://www.tyndall.ie/phd-materials-and-devices

An annual student stipend of €18,000.00 applies for this successful candidate for this position.  Yearly University academic fees will paid by the Tyndall National Institute.