Scanning tunneling microscopy study of the epitaxial growth of strained In0.82Ga0.18As layers on InP

Porte, L.; Krapf, Pascal; Robach, Y.; Phaner, M.; Gendry, M.; Hollinger, G.

doi:10.1016/0039-6028(95)01091-2

Cited by 12 publications

(7 citation statements)

References 13 publications

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“…This paper is concerned with the case of larger misfits (X0:02) that are obtained by epitaxial growth of InGaAs on InP(0 0 1) substrate. The formation of coherently strained islands has been observed for a large variety of heteroepitaxial III-V systems, e.g., for InAs/ GaAs(0 0 1) [6][7][8], InAs/InP(0 0 1) [9,10], InGaAs/ GaAs(0 0 1) [11], InGaAs/InP(0 0 1) [12,13]. Most of them relies onto the case of epitaxy growth at compressive strain (o0).…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 98%

Stress and surface energies versus surface nanostructuring: the InGaAs/InP(001) epitaxial system

Porte

2004

Journal of Crystal Growth

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Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 98%

Stress and surface energies versus surface nanostructuring: the InGaAs/InP(001) epitaxial system

Porte

2004

Journal of Crystal Growth

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“…For the 1 ML deposit (Fig. 1a), the surface morphology is actually representative of a layer-by-layer growth mode quite similarly to the surface obtained on the buffer layer [14]; small isotropic nuclei, homogeneously distributed, evolve towards the formation of 1 ML high anisotropic platelets elongated in the [110] direction. Anisotropic surface diffusion or different reactivities at step edges may contribute to this anisotropy.…”

mentioning

confidence: 94%

“…Upper layers start to nucleate while the lower layer is not completely filled. An STM image of the buffer layer exhibits only two levels at the same scale [14]. On the upper levels, in Fig.…”

mentioning

confidence: 98%

Strain-induced formation of self-assembled nanostructures in the epitaxial growth of InAs and GaAs on InP(001)

Robach¹,

Phaner²,

Solère³

et al. 1998

Applied Physics A: Materials Science & Processing

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The evolution of surface morphology in epitaxial InAs and GaAs strained layers grown on InP(001) was investigated by scanning tunneling microscopy. For compressive InAs layers, well-defined nanowires were formed at the onset of the 2D/3D growth mode transition. These wires have base width and height distributions peaked at around 230 Å and 20 Å, respectively. The sharp 2D/3D transition is associated with a large reorganization of matter. In contrast, for tensile GaAs layers the growth mode is characterized by a gradual roughening process.There is increasing interest in the formation of low-dimensional semiconductor structures, such as quantum dots or wires, which, due to quantum confinement effects, exhibit novel physical properties leading to important applications in optoelectronics. One of the promising paths towards the formation of such nanostructures is to exploit spontaneous self-organization phenomena in the early stages of the heteroepitaxial growth of strained semiconductor layers. For a relatively high intrinsic strain, the growth evolves beyond a critical thickness from an initial layer-by-layer growth mode to the formation of coherent 3D islands (Stranski-Krastanov growth mode). This strain-induced self-assembling method has been applied to a wide range of III-V heterostructures, such as In 1−x Ga x As/GaAs [1][2][3][4] or InP/GaAs [5,6]. Quantum dots which exhibit ordering in size, shape and lateral arrangement have been successfully produced by both the metalorganic vapor-phase epitaxy (MOVPE) and molecular beam epitaxy (MBE) growth methods, and their optical properties have been largely characterized [7,8]. Although it was suggested by Tersoff et al.[9] that quantum wires might even be formed in that way, most studies of quantum wire formation have concentrated on the controlled epitaxial growth on patterned or vicinal surfaces [10][11][12]. For optoelectronic applications significant progress must still be achieved to control the size distribution of these 3D nanostructures. Therefore, * Corresponding author a good understanding of the physical processes that govern the strain-induced 3D islanding remains a real challenge.The In 1−x Ga x As/InP system offers a particularly interesting situation because it allows us to study the epitaxial growth of either compressively strained (x < 0.47) or tensilely strained (x > 0.47) layers. In that system the maximum attainable strain corresponds to compressively strained InAs/InP(001) layers (ε = −3.1%) and tensilely strained GaAs/InP(001) layers (ε = 3.7%). We study here the initial stages of growth for these two extreme cases, using scanning tunneling microscopy (STM) to characterize the growing crystal surface. The formation, in the compression case, of well-ordered nanowires at the onset of the 2D/3D growth mode transition will be more particularly described.Epitaxial layers were grown by molecular beam epitaxy in a RIBER 2300 system connected under ultrahigh vacuum to an STM chamber equipped with a beetle-type scanning tunneling microscope [13]. After t...

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“…7 The 18 As layers epitaxially grown on ͑001͒InP substrate under cation-stabilized conditions: ͑a͒ 480 nmϫ480 nm and ͑b͒ 120 nmϫ120 nm STM images of a 3 ML strained layer. 1͑c͔͒.…”

Section: Resultsmentioning

confidence: 99%

Layer by layer growth mode stabilization and step-edge smoothing of cation-stabilized In1−xGaxAs strained layers grown on InP

Robach

1998

Journal of Vacuum Science &Amp; Technology B: Microelectronics and Nanometer Structures Processing, Measurement, and Phenomena

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Scanning tunneling microscopy has been used to study the surface morphology of strained In 1Ϫx Ga x As layers ͑either 2% compressively or 2% tensilely strained for xϭ0.18 or xϭ0.75, respectively͒ grown by molecular beam epitaxy on ͑001͒ InP substrate under cation-stabilized conditions. Under such growing conditions a smooth two-dimensional ͑2D͒ surface morphology is well preserved until the onset of plastic relaxation. This behavior is completely unlike the 2D/3D growth mode transition observed under As-stabilized conditions of growth. Along with the 2D growth mode stabilization, a step-edge smoothing is also observed. These results are assigned to a high value of step formation free energy on ͑4ϫ2͒ reconstructed surfaces. The resultant increase in surface tension delays the onset of coherent 3D island formation beyond the onset of plastic relaxation and stabilizes 2D growth.

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Scanning tunneling microscopy study of the epitaxial growth of strained In0.82Ga0.18As layers on InP

Cited by 12 publications

References 13 publications

Stress and surface energies versus surface nanostructuring: the InGaAs/InP(001) epitaxial system

Stress and surface energies versus surface nanostructuring: the InGaAs/InP(001) epitaxial system

Strain-induced formation of self-assembled nanostructures in the epitaxial growth of InAs and GaAs on InP(001)

Layer by layer growth mode stabilization and step-edge smoothing of cation-stabilized In1−xGaxAs strained layers grown on InP

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