Study of the Effect of InP (100) Nitridation Time by XPS Analysis and Electrical Characterisation

Abstract

This work presents a study of the effect of thin indium nitride (InN) layer deposition time, on InP substrate. The nitrides of group III metals as InN are very important materials due to their applications in optoelectronics (light-emitting diodes and laser diodes). In this paper the nitridation of InP (100) surfaces has been studied in situ using X ray photoelectron spectroscopy (XPS) and ex situ by electrical I-V method in order to determine the thickness and the quality of the elaborated nitride films and the electrical properties of the InN/InP interface. After ionic cleaning by Ar+ ions, metallic indium crystallites are created, and the nitridation of the substrates is performed using a plasma glow discharge cell produced indium nitride by reaction with these indium clusters. We used the In4d core levels to monitor the chemical state of the surface and the coverage of the species present. We observed the creation of InN bonds while the In-In metallic bonds decrease. The amount of InN varies for each deposition time. A theoretical model based on stacked layers allows us to calculate the thicknesses δ of InN films produces with different evaporation times of N2.