Nanoscale Growth of GaAs on Patterned Si(111) Substrates by Molecular Beam Epitaxy

Abstract

High-quality and defect-free GaAs were successfully grown via molecular beam epitaxy on silicon dioxide patterned Si(111) substrates by a two-step growth technique. Compared with the one-step approach, the two-step growth scheme has been found to be a better pathway to obtain a superior-quality GaAs on Si. Taking advantages of low energy for both Si(111) surface and GaAs/Si(111) interface, the two-step grown GaAs of total ∼175 nm atop patterned Si(111) substrates exhibits atomically smooth surface morphology, single crystallininty and a remarkably low defect density. A low-temperature GaAs nucleation layer of the two-step growth helps relieve the misfit stress by accommodating the misfit dislocations at the very adjacent GaAs/Si interface. The excellent properties of the two-step grown GaAs were investigated and verified by field-emission scanning electron microscopy, atomic force microscopy, X-ray diffraction, transmission electron microscopy, and Raman spectroscopy. Finally we demonstrated a GaAs on Si solar cell, which could represent an important milestone for future applications in light-emitting diodes, lasers, and photodetectors on Si.

Heteroepitaxy of III–V Zinc Blende Semiconductors on Nanopatterned Substrates

“…Despite this benefit, ART with cylinder hole masks has been investigated only by few research groups [48][49][50]. Hsu et al [48] reported the MOVPE growth of smooth continuous 900 nm thick GaAs layers of low defect density on Si(001) substrate patterned with a round nanohole SiO 2 mask having a hole diameter of 55 nm and aspect ratio of 4.7.…”

“…Although Si(111) does not constitute the main substrate in complementary metal oxide semiconductor technology, a method for the growth of small GaAs layer volumes on Si(111) having structural and morphological characteristics highly attractive for applications has been developed: Chu et al [49] deployed a two-stage MBE growth to obtain monocrystalline GaAs with atomically smooth surface and low defect density in the openings of a SiO 2 hole mask on Si(111). The growth mechanism and thus the properties of the resulting layer can be understood as follows (Figure 16(a)): During the first low-temperature growth stage numerous small GaAs islands form by homogeneous nucleation, which then coalesce.…”

“…Recently, these nanoheteroepitaxy methods have been exploited for the realization of several III-V devices integrated on a Si platform. Examples include laser diodes [59,61], GaAs solar cells [49], and GaAs/In x Ga 1−x As tunnel diodes for digital circuits applied e.g. in inverters or random-access memory cells [62,63].…”

Quest for high-Curie temperature Mn Ge1− diluted magnetic semiconductors for room-temperature spintronics applications

“…Figure 3(a) is a typical AFM image of the SiO 2 mask, clearly showing a regular and repeatable nanohole pattern with a diameter of ~100 nm. After cleaned by standard RCA process [21], the patterned substrate was transferred to the MBE chamber for Mn x Ge 1-x nanodisks growth. After removing the native oxide layer at 950 °C for 10 mins, the substrate was cooled down to 250 °C for the Mn x Ge 1-x deposition with a Ge growth rate of ~0.2 Å/s.…”

Влияние разориентации подложки и ее предварительного травления на структурные и оптические свойства интегрированных гетероструктур GaAs/Si(100), полученных методом газофазной эпитаксии

“…Поэтому наиболее перспективным подходом для ре-шения вышеописанной проблемы является интеграция полупроводниковых соединений GaAs-группы с крем-нием [3]. Появление технологий формирования на по-верхности кремниевого чипа A III B V функциональных элементов создаст предпосылки для появления новых оптоэлектронных устройств с принципиально новой ар-хитектурой по сравнению с существующими комплемен-тарными структурами металл−оксид−полупроводник (КМОП) [4].…”