Low-temperature PECVD of nanodevice-Grade nc-3C-SiC

In this work, we report a plasma-based synthesis of nanodevice-grade nc-3C-SiC films, with very high growth rates (7-9 nm min-1) at low and ULSI technology-compatible process temperatures (400-550 °C), featuring: (i) high nanocrystalline fraction (67% at 550 °C); (ii) good chemical purity; (iii) excellent stoichiometry throughout the entire film; (iv) wide optical band gap (3.22-3.71 eV); (v) refractive index close to that of single-crystalline 3C-SiC, and; (vi) clear, uniform, and defect-free Si-SiC interface. The counter-intuitive low SiC hydrogenation in a H2-rich plasma process is explained by hydrogen atom desorption-mediated crystallization.

[1]  J. Sturm,et al.  Low temperature chemical vapor deposition growth of β-SiC on (100) Si using methylsilane and device characteristics , 1997 .

[2]  V. Dalal,et al.  Influence of pressure and ion bombardment on the growth and properties of nanocrystalline silicon materials , 2004 .

[3]  W. Fuß,et al.  Chemical vapor deposition of silicon carbide powders using pulsed CO2 Lasers , 1993 .

[4]  I. Bello,et al.  Epitaxy on Diamond by Chemical Vapor Deposition: A Route to High‐Quality Cubic Boron Nitride for Electronic Applications , 2004 .

[5]  M. Mehregany,et al.  The mechanical properties of polycrystalline 3C-SiC films grown on polysilicon substrates by atmospheric pressure chemical-vapor deposition , 2006 .

[6]  Y. Tawada,et al.  Wide band‐gap hydrogenated amorphous silicon carbide prepared from a liquid aromatic carbon source , 1992 .

[7]  L. Gregoratti,et al.  Bottom–Up Fabrication of Carbon‐Rich Silicon Carbide Nanowires by Manipulation of Nanometer‐Sized Ethanol Menisci , 2005 .

[8]  Fabrice Gourbilleau,et al.  Low temperature deposition of nanocrystalline silicon carbide thin films , 2000 .

[9]  M. Scarselli,et al.  XPS and STM study of SiC synthesized by acetylene and disilane reaction with the Si(1 0 0)2 × 1 surface , 2005 .

[10]  Feng Liao,et al.  Superhard nanocrystalline silicon carbide films , 2005 .

[11]  R. Rizk,et al.  Influence of substrate temperature on growth of nanocrystalline silicon carbide by reactive magnetron sputtering , 2005 .

[12]  M. Ervin,et al.  Effects of the Addition of Silane during Carbonization on the Epitaxy of 3C-SiC on Si , 2002 .

[13]  Y. Kohtoku,et al.  A Tough, Thermally Conductive Silicon Carbide Composite with High Strength up to 1600°C in Air , 1998 .

[14]  K. Ostrikov,et al.  Deterministic plasma-aided synthesis of high-quality nanoislanded nc-SiC films , 2007 .

[15]  Kostya Ostrikov,et al.  Colloquium: Reactive plasmas as a versatile nanofabrication tool , 2005 .

[16]  Q. Wahab,et al.  Growth of epitaxial 3C‐SiC films on (111) silicon substrates at 850 °C by reactive magnetron sputtering , 1993 .

[17]  S. Logothetidis,et al.  Dielectric function and reflectivity of 3C–silicon carbide and the component perpendicular to the c axis of 6H–silicon carbide in the energy region 1.5–9.5 eV , 1996 .

[18]  F. C. Loh,et al.  Infrared and x-ray photoelectron spectroscopy studies of as-prepared and furnace-annealed radio-frequency sputtered amorphous silicon carbide films , 1998 .

[19]  J. Gasiot,et al.  A simple method for the determination of the optical constants n, k and the thickness of a weakly absorbing thin film , 1976 .

[20]  Igor Levchenko,et al.  Surface fluxes of Si and C adatoms at initial growth stages of SiC quantum dots , 2007 .

[21]  J. Wigmore,et al.  Characterization of 3C-SiC films grown on monocrystalline Si by reactive hydrogen plasma sputtering , 1997 .

[22]  Y. Li,et al.  Improvement of the optical and photoelectric properties of hydrogenated amorphous silicon‐carbon alloys by using trisilylmethane as a feedstock , 1991 .

[23]  Eray S. Aydil,et al.  Mechanism of hydrogen-induced crystallization of amorphous silicon , 2002, Nature.

[24]  G.‐C. Yi,et al.  Heteroepitaxial Growth of High‐Quality GaN Thin Films on Si Substrates Coated with Self‐Assembled Sub‐micrometer‐sized Silica Balls , 2006 .

[25]  Qing Peng,et al.  A general strategy for nanocrystal synthesis , 2005, Nature.

[26]  Solomon,et al.  Selective low-power plasma decomposition of silane-methane mixtures for the preparation of methylated amorphous silicon. , 1988, Physical review. B, Condensed matter.

[27]  Partha S. Dutta,et al.  Low temperature deposition of nanocrystalline silicon carbide films by plasma enhanced chemical vapor deposition and their structural and optical characterization , 2003 .

[28]  I. R. Jones,et al.  Low-frequency, high-density, inductively coupled plasma sources: Operation and applications , 2001 .

[29]  Yahong Xie,et al.  Single‐Step Fabrication of Nickel Films with Arrayed Macropores and Nanostructured Skeletons , 2006 .

[30]  Igor Levchenko,et al.  Control of core-shell structure and elemental composition of binary quantum dots , 2007 .

[31]  Cheong Hoong Diong,et al.  RF plasma sputtering deposition of hydroxyapatite bioceramics : synthesis, performance, and biocompatibility , 2005 .