The Template Technique Applied to Epitaxial Growth of CrSi2 on Silicon (111)

Abstract

ABSTRACTThe template growth technique was applied to the growth of CrSi2 thin films on Si(111) by UHV E-gun evaporation. A 4He+ channeling yield of -50% was obtained for an epitaxial -2100 Å-thick film of continuous morphology grown at 450° C The heteroepitaxial relationship is CrSi2 (001) / Si (lll) with CrSi2[210] ∥ Si<110>.In the case of film formation simply via reactive deposition epitaxy (RDE, chromium evaporation onto hot substrates) a severe crystallinity-Morphology tradeoff is always observed. Continuous films are formed at low temperature but no long-range epitaxy is found. On the other hand, high temperature annealing of these films induces the formation of islands that show good epitaxial alignment with the substrate. This tradeoff was addressed with the template growth technique.