Investigation of the relaxation behavior of Si1−xCx alloys during epitaxial UHV-CVD growth

✍ Scribed by I. Ostermay; T. Kammler; A. Naumann; J.W. Bartha; P. Kücher

• Book ID: 103843927
• Publisher: Elsevier Science
• Year: 2008
• Tongue: English
• Weight: 915 KB
• Volume: 154-155
• Category: Article
• ISSN: 0921-5107
• DOI: 10.1016/j.mseb.2008.10.011

✦ Synopsis

In this work, the epitaxial growth of Si 1-x C x alloys using an Ultra High Vacuum Chemical Vapor Deposition (UHV-CVD) system was studied. Si 1-x C x layers were grown in a temperature range of 550-650 • C and characterized using rocking curve X-ray diffraction (XRD), atomic force microscopy (AFM) as well as Fourier transform infrared spectroscopy (FT-IR). It was found that with increasing carbon precursor flow (Methylsilane) the amount of substitutional carbon rises up to a critical value. After a maximum in substitutional carbon content is reached, a further increase of carbon fraction leads to a reduction of the strain. By FT-IR, the non-substitutional carbon was determined to form 3C-SiC precipitates already during growth. A strong correlation between the increase of Methylsilane flow and the formation of coherent precipitates even at low carbon fractions was observed. A low deposition temperature was found to promote the precipitation of 3C-SiC.