SYNTHESIS OF FINE AIN POWDER BY VAPOR-PHASE REACTION

AIN ceramics have a high thermal conductance and electric resistance, thus they can be applied to ceramic substrates to produce semiconductors. Although AIN powder has been synthesized in industry principally by the carbothermal reduction of Al//2O//3, these are batch methods which are disadvantageous to continuous production. The vapour phase reaction, which has been employed to prepare high-purity AIN in film form, seems to be feasible for continuous production. The authors investigated the synthesis of fine AIN powder by the vapour phase reaction between AlCl//3 and NH//3. The powder obtained was identified by powder X-ray diffraction (XRD) and was examined by scanning electron microscopy (SEM). The particle size distribution was measured.