Determination of crystallographic polarity of ZnO layers

Abstract

The crystallographic polarity of ZnO epilayers was determined by x-ray diffraction (XRD) using anomalous dispersion near the Zn K edge. The method is not destructive and is straightforward to carry out using a typical XRD measurement system. The polarity difference between the Zn (0001) and O (0001¯) surfaces could be easily determined using a {0002} diffraction peak and the Bremstrahlung radiation from a Cu rotating anode source. By using the normalized pre- and post-Zn K-edge diffraction intensity ratios of the (0002) diffraction peak, Zn polar and O polar ZnO layers could always be distinguished but, the absolute value of the ratio was found to change with layer thickness. The absolute value of the ratio with layer thickness was found to have a linear dependence on layer thickness allowing determination of the polarity of (0001) ZnO epilayers with a single x-ray measurement and the known layer thickness in conjunction with standard data. Acid etching results confirmed the veracity of the polarity determination of the XRD measurement. To test the technique, Zn and O polar ZnO layers were grown by radical source molecular beam epitaxy (RS MBE) on MgO buffer layers on c-sapphire substrate and O polar ZnO layers were grown on a-plane substrates and measured using the x-ray technique with excellent agreement.