VAPOR ETCHING OF GAAS AND ALGAAS BY CH3I

With the objective of developing an improved process for in situ etching of GaAs-based materials in organometallic vapor phase epitaxy reactors, GaAs wafers and AlxGa1-xAs epilayers have been etched with CH3I vapor in a horizontal reactor operated at atmospheric pressure with H-2 or He carrier gas. For a H-2 flow rate of 2.1 s lpm, etching temperatures from 400 to 625-degrees-C, and CH3I mol fractions (y(CH3I)) from 0.0012 to 0.015, the measured GaAs etch rate r (in angstrom min-1) is given by r = k0y(CH3)0.83 exp[ - 45(kcal mol-1)/RT] with k0 = 3.2 x 10(16) angstrom min-1. The value of k0 depends on the type of carrier gas, flow rate, total pressure, and reactor geometry. The etch rate appears to be controlled mainly by the decomposition of CH3I to CH3 and I, for which the activation energy has been reported to be 43.5 kcal mol-1. The etch rate of AlxGa1-xAs epilayers with x up to 0.7, which was measured at 480-degrees-C with y(CH3I) = 0.015, does not depend on Al content. The surface morphology of etched GaAs wafers improves with decreasing temperature. Specular surfaces are maintained at temperatures below 500-degrees-C for etch depths up to 5000 angstrom.