Impact of the Cu Substrate Surface Preparation on the Morphological, Superconductive and RF Properties of the Nb Superconductive Coatings

Nowadays, one of the main issues of the superconducting thin film resonant cavities is the Cu surface preparation. A better understanding of the impact of copper surface preparation on the morphological, superconductive (SC) and RF properties of the coating, is mandatory in order to improve the performances of superconducting cavities by coating techniques. ARIES H₂020 collaboration includes a specific work package (WP15) to study the influence of Cu surface polishing on the SRF performances of Nb coatings that involves a team of 8 research groups from 7 different countries. In the present work, a comparison of 4 different polishing processes for Cu (Tumbling, EP, SUBU, EP+SUBU) is presented through the evaluation of the SC and morphological properties of Nb thin film coated on Cu planar samples and QPR samples, polished with different procedures. Effects of laser annealing on Nb thin films have also been studied. Different surface characterizations have been applied: roughness measurements, SEM, EDS, XRD, AFM, and thermal and photo-stimulated exoelectrons measurements. SC properties were evaluated with PPMS, and QPR measurements will be carry out at HZB in the beginning of 2019.