Impurity effects on both the creation and the migration of Ga vacancies in GaAs

Abstract

The effects of impurities, such as Si and Be, on both the creation and the migration of Ga vacancies in annealing of GaAs were investigated by a slow positron beam technique. The results show that vacancies diffuse from the surface during the annealing and one of the dominant types is a monovacancy of Ga, VGa, in Be-doped GaAs and/or Si-doped GaAs, while the other is a divacancy of VGa-VAs in undoped GaAs. In annealing the bilayer structures composed of the Si-doped layer grown on the Be-doped layer, it was found that VGa is a major type of defect rather than VGa-VAs if the Si concentration is higher or lower than the Be one in GaAs, but VGa-VAs is dominant if the concentrations of the impurities are similar. This proposes that the interaction between Si and Be is stronger than that of VAs-BeGa and/or VGa-SiGa. The Ga interstitial IGa is created in the Be-doped layer where IGa interacts with VGa created from the surface and suppresses the migration of VGa. This supports the validity of the kick-out mechanism involving a column-III interstitial rather than the Longini mechanism for Be diffusion in GaAs. In Si-doped GaAs, VGa is created from the surface and the diffusion constant of VGa decreases with the increase of Si doping concentration. This implies that VGa forms a complex of SiGa-VGa and the interaction time of VGa at the Si donor by making a complex of SiGa-VGa is a rate-limiting step in the diffusion of VGa in GaAs. The present results propose the creation of IGa and VGa in the Be-diffused GaAs and in Si-diffused GaAs, respectively. This is consistent with the Fermi-level effect of the impurities on the creation of those defects.