Growth and photoconductor properties of HgCdTe epilayers grown by hot wall epitaxy method

Abstract

Hg 1− x Cd x Te (MCT) was grown by hot wall epitaxy. Prior to the MCT growth, the CdTe (1 1 1) buffer layer was grown on the GaAs substrate at the temperature of 590°C for 15 min. When the thickness of the CdTe buffer layer was 5 μm or even thicker, the full-width at half-maximum values obtained from the X-ray rocking curves were found to significantly decrease. After a good quality CdTe buffer layer was grown, the MCT epilayers were grown on the CdTe(1 1 1) /GaAs substrate at various temperatures in situ. The crystal quality for those epilayers was investigated by means of the X-ray rocking curves and the photocurrent experiment. The photoconductor characterization for the epilayers was also measured. The energy band gap of MCT was determined from the photocurrent measurement and the x composition rates from the temperature dependence of the energy band gap were also obtained.