Differences in Auger electron spectroscopy and x-ray photoelectron spectroscopy results on the bonding states of oxygen with β-SiC(100) surfaces

Abstract

Auger electron spectroscopy (AES) and x-ray photoelectron spectroscopy (XPS) measurements have been carried out on the β-SiC(100) surface simultaneously. The AES and XPS results differ significantly in the bonding state of oxygen for both as-grown surfaces and as-etched surfaces. Differences in the same carbon-KLL Auger spectra induced by both electron beams and x rays from the same surface suggest that the electron beam used in AES removed considerable amounts of carbonaceous species in the contaminant layers. Furthermore, comparison of the Si 2p and Si LVV spectra revealed that the SiOx (x<2) species on the surface was also reduced by the electron beam used in AES. Although previous AES results have shown that both as-grown and as-etched surfaces of β-SiC(100) were covered with only submonolayer coverage of oxygen bonded to Si atoms, with no detectable carbonaceous contaminants, this work shows that the real surfaces, however, are covered with several tens of contaminant layers, including SiO, CC, CH, and CO bonds.