Structural Investigation of Heteroepitaxial 3C-SiC Grown on 4H-SiC Substrates

Abstract

3C-SiC epilayers grown on Si-face nominally on-axis 4H-SiC substrate are characterized with X-ray diffraction techniques. The aim was to investigate if these 3C-SiC epilayers were grown by single domain growth. The results show that all samples start by having several nucleation centers all over the substrate surface and the growth continues with two domain formations. As the growth proceeds one domain overtakes the growth and single domain crystal growth occurs. This single domain was further investigated and the results show that it seems to contain many sub-domains with same lattice constant but slightly tilted.