Epitaxial Growth of Ag_xCu_1−xI on Al₂O₃(0001)

Abstract

Herein, the epitaxial growth of alloy layers and isolated small crystals on using close distance sublimation (CDS) technique is presented. Single‐phase thin films are fabricated up to an Ag content of , while at higher Ag contents the β‐phase is also observed. The epitaxial relationships between the deposited layers and the substrate as well as the structure type are discussed for different alloy compositions. In addition, a further approach is presented for deposition of polycrystalline single‐phase thin films for Ag contents up to based on the solid‐state reaction of AgI layers on substrate with CuI. Furthermore, for differently prepared samples it is shown that the near‐band‐edge emission at 2 K is dominated by excitonic recombination, whereas the spectral position of the emission profile can be tuned by the alloy composition.