USA As Represented by Secretary of the Navy

Brenda L VanMil

Charles R Eddy, Jr

David Kurt Gaskill

Rachael L Myers-Ward

Robert E Stahlbush

Kok-Keong Lew

A method for reducing/eliminating basal plane dislocations from SiC epilayers is disclosed. An article having: an off-axis SiC substrate having an off-axis angle of no more than 6&#xb0;; and a SiC epitaxial layer grown on the substrate. The epitaxial layer has no more than 2 basal plane dislocations per cmat the surface of the epitaxial layer. A method of growing an epitaxial SiC layer on an off-axis SiC substrate by: flowing a silicon source gas, a carbon source gas, and a carrier gas into a growth chamber under growth conditions to epitaxially grow SiC on the substrate in the growth chamber. The substrate has an off-axis angle of no more than 6&#xb0;. The growth conditions include: a growth temperature of 1530-1650&#xb0; C.; a pressure of 50-125 mbar; a C/H gas flow ratio of 9.38&#xd7;10-1.5&#xd7;10; a C/Si ratio of 0.5-3; a carbon source gas flow rate during ramp to growth temperature from 0 to 15 sccm; and an electron or hole concentration of 10-10/cm.

Reduction of basal plane dislocations in epitaxial SiC

A method of: flowing a silicon source gas, a carbon source gas, and a carrier gas into a growth chamber under growth conditions to epitaxial grow silicon carbide on a wafer in the growth chamber; stopping or reducing the flow of the silicon source gas to interrupt the silicon carbide growth and maintaining the flow of the carrier gas while maintaining an elevated temperature in the growth chamber for a period of time; and resuming the flow of the silicon source gas to reinitiate silicon carbide growth. The wafer remains in the growth chamber throughout the method.

Method of producing epitaxial layers with low basal plane dislocation concentrations

A method of: supplying sources of carbon and silicon into a chemical vapor deposition chamber; collecting exhaust gases from the chamber; performing mass spectrometry on the exhaust gases; and correlating a partial pressure of a carbon species in the exhaust gases to a carbon:silicon ratio in the chamber.

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Alexandria, VA, United States of America

Brenda L VanMil