Homoepitaxial Growth of Si at Low Temperature (325 °C)

Electron cyclotron resonance chemical vapor deposition (ECR-CVD) is used to grow to prepare epitaxial films on Si(100), Si(111), and Si(311) at 325 °C with a growth rate of 10…12 nm/min. On Si(100) up to a layer thickness of more than 300 nm the films exhibit a well defined and smooth interface and a perfectly ordered lattice structure. Beyond a critical thickness of about 500 nm the formation of conically shaped, amorphous regions was observed. At a thickness of 1.6 µm only 10… 15 % of the surface consists of these amorphous cones. On Si(311), Si(111), and Si(011) the critical epitaxial thicknesses h epi depends on the crystallographic orientation of the substrate in the sequence h epi (311) > h epi (111) > h epi (011) with an abrupt change of the film structure from crystalline to amorphous