Preferential growth of Si films on 6H-SiC(0 0 0 1) C-face

Abstract

Si/SiC heterojunctions are successfully prepared on 6H-SiC(0001) C-face by low-pressure chemical vapor deposition. X-ray diffraction and scanning electron microscopy are used to investigate the growth orientation and the surface morphology of the Si films. The results indicate that preferential growth orientation of 〈111〉 can be achieved in a temperature range of 825–1000°C. Within the temperature range, grain size of the Si films becomes larger as temperature increases. Molecular dynamics calculation results indicate that the interface formation energy of the Si(111)/6H-SiC(0001) C-face is smaller than that of Si(110)/6H-SiC(0001) C-face. This is the reason why the Si films prefer to grow on the (111) crystal plane.