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Aluminum nitride-silicon carbide solid solutions grown by plasma-assisted, gas-source molecular beam epitaxy

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Abstract

Solid solutions of aluminum nitride (AlN) and silicon carbide (SiC) have been grown at 900–1300 °C on vicinal α (6H)-SiC(0001) substrates by plasma-assisted, gas-source molecular beam epitaxy. Under specific processing conditions, films of (AlN)x(SiC) 1−x with 0.2 ≤ x ≤ 0.8, as determined by Auger electron spectrometry (AES), were deposited. Reflection high-energy electron diffraction (RHEED) was used to determine the crystalline quality, surface character, and epilayer polytype. Analysis of the resulting surfaces was also performed by scanning electron microscopy (SEM). High-resolution transmission electron microscopy (HRTEM) revealed that monocrystalline films with x ≥ 0.25 had the wurtzite (2H) crystal structure; however, films with x < 0.25 had the zincblende (3C) crystal structure.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Materials Science and Engineering, North Carolina State University, Box 7907, Raleigh, 27695-7907, North Carolina, USA

    R. S. Kern, L. B. Rowland, S. Tanaka & R. F. Davis

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  1. R. S. Kern
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  2. L. B. Rowland
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  3. S. Tanaka
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  4. R. F. Davis
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Kern, R.S., Rowland, L.B., Tanaka, S. et al. Aluminum nitride-silicon carbide solid solutions grown by plasma-assisted, gas-source molecular beam epitaxy. Journal of Materials Research 13, 1816–1822 (1998). https://doi.org/10.1557/JMR.1998.0257

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1557/JMR.1998.0257

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