Two-dimensional nucleation at stacking fault during InP microchannel epitaxy

摘要

An atomic force micrsocoy (AFM) is used to study the origin of a strong step soruce in InP microchannel epitaxy (MCE). The AFM images showed that two-dimensional nuclei were frequently generated at a stacking fault (SF). It was found that the shape of the two-dimensional nuclei was not circular but bow-like, whose chord coincides with the line of allow the nucleation to occur at a very low critical supersaturation. As a result, two-dimenisonal nucleation becomes a major source supplying the grwoth steps when SF exists even under a very low supersaturaiton usually employed in MCE.