Epitaxial vapor growth of gallium antimonide

Abstract

The epitaxial vapor growth of gallium antimonide in the conventional closed tube process was studied by using polycrystalline gallium antimonide as a source material. The transport agents used were hydrogen chloride, antimony penta-chloride and iodine. The growth rates were found to range from 0.5 to 10 μm/ hr when the initially charged amount of the transport agent was from 10 −8 to 10 −6 mole/cm 3. The electrical properties of the grown layers were studied by the Van der Pauw method 1). The minimum of the hole concentration in the grown layer was 1.5−2 X 10 16/cm 3 and the mobility was larger than 700 cm 2/V sec. The p-n junction diodes were also prepared by using the same vapor growth technique. They had good rectification characteristics. The surface morphology of the grown layer was strongly dependent on the pretreatment of substrate surface: The surface of the grown layer was very smooth when the substrate surface was vapor-etched for about 30 min prior to the deposition.