Bulk Single-Crystal Growth of Ce/Gd₃(Al,Ga)₅O₁₂ from Melt without a Precious Metal Crucible by Pulling from a Cold Container

Abstract

We report the growth of cerium-doped multicomponent garnet (Ce/GAGG) single crystals based on crystal pulling from a melt using a cold container without employing a precious metal crucible. This novel method is described in detail. We measured the optical, luminescence, and scintillation characteristics of several samples cut from three crystals and compared them with a commercial Ce/GAGG crystal. The best samples from the set are fully comparable in all characteristics with the commercial reference crystal, demonstrating the practical potential of this method. Avoidance of an expensive precious metal crucible in this method makes crystal growth much more economical.

Growth of bulk β-Ga2O3 crystals from melt without precious-metal crucible by pulling from a cold container

“…These values were observed with the use of a 4-turn RF coil with a coil height of 50 mm. Our previous experiments on melting Gd-Al-Ga garnet in the same size Cu basket demonstrated that the frequency change after the final melting of the raw materials was ≤ 2–3 kHz 19 . These data are in good agreement with the higher electric conductivity of undoped Ga 2 O 3 melt.…”

“…For basket sizes of 85–100 mm, unmelted material was observed in the center of the baskets. In our previous research for the crucible-free growth of Gd–Al–Ga crystals, we successfully applied an original 0.4–0.5 MHz SiC MOSFET transistor generator with power up to 35 kW 19 . In this study, the same generator was used for the growth of β-Ga 2 O 3 crystals with larger size baskets.…”

“…Recently, we successfully grew Gd–Al–Ga crystals (melting point ~ 1820 °C) using the oxide crystal growth from cold crucible (OCCC) method and avoiding the use of a precious-metal crucible 19 . The OCCC method combines two conventional and well-known methods: the cold crucible method [ 20 – 24 ] for the heat source and the CZ method for crystal growth.…”

Formation energy crossings in Ga2O3-Al2O3 quasibinary system: ordered structures and phase transitions in (Al x Ga1−x )2O3

“…[17][18][19] The most stable structure is β-Ga 2 O 3 with space group 12 (C2/m), which has recently become a material of great interest for electronic devices due to a large bandgap (4.76 eV) and the establishment of large and highquality single crystal growth method. [20][21][22][23] On the other hand, Al 2 O 3 shows α crystal structure (corundum, R-3cH) as the most stable polymorph having a much larger bandgap of 8.8 eV. 24) Considering a quasibinary system between Ga 2 O 3 and Al 2 O 3 , variation in the bandgap should manifest at specific Al or Ga composition with values within the range of their pure phases.…”