It is believed that atomic-scale surface steps cause defects in single-crystal films grown heteroepitaxially on SiC substrates. A method is described whereby surface steps can be grown out of existence on arrays of device-size mesas on commercial “on-axis” SiC wafers. Step-free mesas with dimensions up to 200 μm square have been produced on 4H-SiC wafers and up to 50 μm square on a 6H-SiC wafer. A limiting factor in scaling up the size and yield of the step-free mesas is the density of screw dislocations in the SiC wafers. The fundamental significance of this work is that it demonstrates that two-dimensional nucleation of SiC can be suppressed while carrying out step-flow growth on (0001)SiC. The application of this method should enable the realization of improved heteroepitaxially-grown SiC and GaN device structures.
Lateral homoepitaxial growth of thin cantilevers emanating from mesa patterns that were reactive ion etched into on-axis commercial SiC substrates prior to growth is reported. The thin cantilevers form after pure stepflow growth removes almost all atomic steps from the top surface of a mesa, after which additional adatoms collected by the large step-free surface migrate to the mesa sidewall where they rapidly incorporate into the crystal near the top of the mesa sidewall. The lateral propagation of the step-free cantilevered surface is significantly affected by pregrowth mesa shape and orientation, with the highest lateral expansion rates observed at the inside concave corners of V-shaped pregrowth mesas with arms lengthwise oriented along the ͗1100͘ direction. Complete spanning of the interiors of V's and other mesa shapes with concave corners by webbed cantilevers was accomplished. Optical microscopy, synchrotron white beam x-ray topography and atomic force microscopy analysis of webbed regions formed over a micropipe and closed-core screw dislocations show that c-axis propagation of these defects is terminated by the webbing. Despite the nonoptimized process employed in this initial study, webbed surfaces as large as 1.4ϫ10 Ϫ3 cm 2 , more than four times the pregrowth mesa area, were grown. However, the largest webbed surfaces were not completely free of bilayer steps, due to unintentional growth of 3C-SiC that occurred in the nonoptimized process. Further process optimization should enable larger step-free webs to be realized.
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