We have investigated the epitaxial growth of (111)ZrN films on (111)Si substrate at a relatively low temperature using an ultrabigh vacuum DC magnetron sputtering system. The film quality obtained and the epitaxial relationship were evaluated on the basis of analyses of X-ray diffraction (XRD) patterns, X-ray pole figures, and grazing incidence angle X-ray reflectivity (GIXR), transmission electron microscopy (TEM) and atomic force microscopy (AFM) results. It was found that (111)ZrN films were grown epitaxially on (111)Si at a substrate temperature of 500 degrees C with the directional relationship ZrN(111)[110] parallel to Si(111)[110]. GIXR and AFM results also revealed that the epitaxial (111)ZrN film has a high film density comparable to that of bulk ZrN and a fairly flat surface morphology with an average surface roughness of approximately 0.25 nm. (c) 2006 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.