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Special Issue "Epitaxial Growth of Semiconductor Materials and Devices"

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A special issue of Crystals (ISSN 2073-4352). This special issue belongs to the section "Inorganic Crystalline Materials".

Deadline for manuscript submissions: 15 October 2023 | Viewed by 2791

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Special Issue Editors

Dr. Stephanie Tomasulo

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Guest Editor

U.S. Naval Research Laboratory, Washington, DC 20375, USA
Interests: molecular beam epitaxy; III-V alloys; infrared optoelectronics

Dr. Aaron Ptak

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Guest Editor

National Renewable Energy Laboratory, Golden, CO 80401, USA
Interests: epitaxy, III-V materials and devices, and novel growth methods

Special Issue Information

Dear Colleagues,

Epitaxial growth is a valuable method for exploring the physical limits of semiconductor material, accessing novel (nano)structures requiring near-atomic precision, and producing critical devices. It is responsible for a significant range of semiconductor devices and applications including but certainly not limited to optoelectronics, photovoltaics, biomedical engineering, and power electronics. The ability to grow single-crystalline, low-defect semiconductor material is a necessity to innovate within these paradigm-shifting applications. While epitaxy has served this purpose for decades, advances continue to be made through development of novel materials, structures, and growth techniques. Recent examples include the resurgence of hydride vapor phase epitaxy, as well as the development of remote epitaxy and droplet epitaxy to name a few. This Special Issue seeks submissions in which epitaxy enables the furthering of semiconductor material understanding, the development of novel/unique growth techniques, as well as the recent progress in epitaxy-based devices.

Dr. Stephanie Tomasulo
Dr. Aaron Ptak
Guest Editors

Manuscript Submission Information

Manuscripts should be submitted online at www.mdpi.com by registering and logging in to this website. Once you are registered, click here to go to the submission form. Manuscripts can be submitted until the deadline. All submissions that pass pre-check are peer-reviewed. Accepted papers will be published continuously in the journal (as soon as accepted) and will be listed together on the special issue website. Research articles, review articles as well as short communications are invited. For planned papers, a title and short abstract (about 100 words) can be sent to the Editorial Office for announcement on this website.

Submitted manuscripts should not have been published previously, nor be under consideration for publication elsewhere (except conference proceedings papers). All manuscripts are thoroughly refereed through a single-blind peer-review process. A guide for authors and other relevant information for submission of manuscripts is available on the Instructions for Authors page. Crystals is an international peer-reviewed open access monthly journal published by MDPI.

Please visit the Instructions for Authors page before submitting a manuscript. The Article Processing Charge (APC) for publication in this open access journal is 2000 CHF (Swiss Francs). Submitted papers should be well formatted and use good English. Authors may use MDPI's English editing service prior to publication or during author revisions.

Keywords

epitaxy
semiconductors
optoelectronics
photovoltaics
power electronics
biomedical engineering
remote epitaxy
droplet epitaxy
nanostructures
material science
superlattices
quantum wells

Published Papers (4 papers)

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Research

Open AccessArticle

Analysis of Crystalline Defects Caused by Growth on Partially Planarized Spalled (100) GaAs Substrates

and

Crystals 2023, 13(4), 681; https://doi.org/10.3390/cryst13040681 - 15 Apr 2023

Viewed by 655

Abstract

We analyze the effect of growth on non-(100) surfaces resulting from incomplete planarization of spalled GaAs wafers on the defect structure of GaAs solar cell layers grown by hydride vapor phase epitaxy (HVPE). Controlled spalling of (100)-oriented GaAs has the potential to reduce substrate costs for III-V epitaxy; however, it creates regularly faceted surfaces that may complicate the growth of high-quality III-V optoelectronic devices. We leverage the anisotropic growth rate of HVPE to planarize these faceted GaAs substrates, reducing the surface roughness and degree of faceting. We observe degraded solar cell performance and material quality in sample areas where facets are not completely removed. We used dark lock-in thermography and photoluminescence to identify recombination in areas that were not fully planarized. We used cathodoluminescence to identify the presence of extended defects in these regions, which are correlated with bandgap fluctuations in the material. We hypothesize that these defects were created by strain from compositional fluctuations in ternary alloys grown on the faceted surfaces. This work elucidates the potential issues of solar cells grown on faceted surfaces and builds understanding toward realizing high performance III-V photovoltaics with the cost-reduction potential of controlled spalling. Full article

(This article belongs to the Special Issue Epitaxial Growth of Semiconductor Materials and Devices)

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Open AccessArticle

Molecular Beam Epitaxy of Twin-Free Bi₂Se₃ and Sb₂Te₃ on In₂Se₃/InP(111)B Virtual Substrates

Kaushini S. Wickramasinghe

Candice Forrester

and

Maria C. Tamargo

Crystals 2023, 13(4), 677; https://doi.org/10.3390/cryst13040677 - 14 Apr 2023

Viewed by 435

Abstract

Three-dimensional topological insulators (3D-TIs) are a new generation of materials with insulating bulk and exotic metallic surface states that facilitate a wide variety of ground-breaking applications. However, utilization of the surface channels is often hampered by the presence of crystal defects, such as antisites, vacancies, and twin domains. For terahertz device applications, twinning is shown to be highly deleterious. Previous attempts to reduce twins using technologically important InP(111) substrates have been promising, but have failed to completely suppress twin domains while preserving high structural quality. Here we report growth of twin-free molecular beam epitaxial Bi₂Se₃ and Sb₂Te₃ structures on ultra-thin In₂Se₃ layers formed by a novel selenium passivation technique during the oxide desorption of smooth, non-vicinal InP(111)B substrates, without the use of an indium source. The formation of un-twinned In₂Se₃ provides a favorable template to fully suppress twin domains in 3D-TIs, greatly broadening novel device applications in the terahertz regime. Full article

(This article belongs to the Special Issue Epitaxial Growth of Semiconductor Materials and Devices)

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Open AccessArticle

Epitaxial Integration of Dirac Semimetals with Si(001)

Anthony Rice

and

Kirstin Alberi

Crystals 2023, 13(4), 578; https://doi.org/10.3390/cryst13040578 - 28 Mar 2023

Viewed by 450

Abstract

Topological semimetals contain novel combinations of properties that make them useful in a variety of applications, including optoelectronics, spintronics and low energy computing, and catalysis. Although they have been grown with high quality as bulk single crystals, incorporation with semiconductor substrates will ultimately [...] Read more.

_{3}

_{2}

on Si(001) is demonstrated through two routes. First, Cd

_{3}

_{2}

(112) epilayers are grown on Si(001) via an intermediate CdTe(111) buffer layer. Second, Cd

_{3}

_{2}

(112) is grown directly on Si(001). This work sets the foundation for integration of novel semimetal materials with existing CMOS technology. Full article

(This article belongs to the Special Issue Epitaxial Growth of Semiconductor Materials and Devices)

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Open AccessArticle

Ultra-High-Speed Growth of GaAs Solar Cells by Triple-Chamber Hydride Vapor Phase Epitaxy

and

Crystals 2023, 13(3), 370; https://doi.org/10.3390/cryst13030370 - 21 Feb 2023

Cited by 2 | Viewed by 787

Abstract

In photovoltaic (PV) power generation, highly efficient III-V solar cells are promising for emerging mobile applications, such as vehicle-integrated PVs. Although hydride vapor phase epitaxy (HVPE) has received attention due to its lower fabrication costs, realization of high throughput performance while maintaining solar-cell characteristics using this growth method is essential. In this study, the effect of atmospheric-pressure triple-chamber HVPE growth conditions on GaAs solar-cell properties were carefully investigated in conjunction with defect analysis using deep-level transient spectroscopy (DLTS). Based on the analysis on GaAs reaction processes, the suppression of arsine thermal cracking in the HVPE hot-wall reactor was important to achieve fast GaAs growth using a low input V/III ratio. Moreover, the DLTS results revealed that the reduced input V/III ratio was effective in suppressing the generation of EL2 traps, which is a common GaAs midgap complex defect involving arsenic antisites. Although the EL2 trap density increased with the growth rate, the performance of GaAs solar cells that were grown under reduced arsine thermal cracking exhibited almost no considerable cell parameter deterioration at a growth rate of up to 297 μm/h. Consequently, a conversion efficiency of 24% with a high open-circuit voltage of 1.04 V was achieved for the cells that were grown at 200 μm/h. Full article

(This article belongs to the Special Issue Epitaxial Growth of Semiconductor Materials and Devices)

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Special Issue "Epitaxial Growth of Semiconductor Materials and Devices"

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