Study of the structural changes of thin films by in-situ spectrophotometry

The focus of this bachelor thesis was on modifying vacuum chamber to study two different physical topics. First was the absorption of hydrogen in metals. Hydrogen ab- sorption was studied on palladium thin films. Palladium was chosen thanks to its high kinetics of hydrogen absorption at room temperature, which leads palladium to be the model system to study hydrogen absorption. Using optical measurement one can study hydrogen absorption for thin films. From the results of optical transmittance measure- ment, it is possible to study the change of atomic ratio between hydrogen and palladium, i.e. phase transformation. The second topic will be the study of the dependence of vari- ous conditions (initial temperature of sample, pressure) on the energy of laser pulse on laser-induced dewetting, i.e. structural changes in thin films caused by laser annealing. Minimal energy needed to initiate dewetting was calculated from one-dimensional heat equation. Minimal energy needed to initiate dewetting was tested implementing various initial temperatures and energy densities.