Epitaxial growth of germanium thin films on crystal silicon substrates by solid phase crystallization

Abstract

We have investigated the solid phase crystallization (SPC) of amorphous germanium (a-Ge) precursors on single crystalline silicon (c-Si) substrates as seed layers and successfully obtained the epitaxial growth of Ge. The n-type (100) Si substrate is most suitable for preferential growth following the substrate orientation, because the velocity of preferential growth is higher than those on the other substrates and preferential growth is completed before random nucleation. The impurity contamination in the a-Ge precursors probably enhances random nucleation. The epitaxial growth is disturbed by the impurity contamination at a relatively high SPC temperature in the intrinsic and p-type Si substrates with the (100) orientation and the n-type and intrinsic Si substrates with the (111) orientation, because the lower velocity of preferential growth allows random crystallization. Almost no epitaxial growth is observed on the p-type (111) Si substrates even when low-impurity a-Ge precursors are used.