Low-temperature sintering of Pd/Ge films on GaAs

Abstract

Rectifying metal-semiconductor contacts, produced by heat treatment of a thin evaporated layer of Pd/Ge on n-type GaAs, have been studied using Auger electron spectroscopy, x-ray diffraction, and current-voltage measurements. During sintering at temperatures below 350 °C, the Pd and Ge were found to interdiffuse on the nonreacting GaAs substrate to form PdGe and Pd2Ge. The formation of the germanide phases altered the Ge LMM Auger spectra and produced an increase in the Schottky barrier energy from 0.67 to 0.85 eV.