Strain Relief in InxGa1−xAs/GaAs Multiple Layer Systems

ABSTRACTIn a recent paper[l] we presented the notion of a “critical composition” of InxGa1−xAs (x=0.18) which when exceeded results in threading dislocation evolution in InxGa1−xAs (x ≥ 0.18) material grown on GaAs. For InxGa1−xAs compositions below x=0.18, threading dislocation evolution occurs in the GaAs substrate material but not in the InxGa1−xAs epitaxial layer material, this phenomenon being attributed to a yield strength mismatch in favor of InxGa1−xAs at the epilayer growth temperature.In this paper we describe recent results concerning an extension of this work to the study of strain relief in multiple layer systems. It was found that large x (x-0.5) InxGa1−xAs/GaAs layers can be grown having extremely low dislocation densities (<104/cm2 ) by step increasing the InxGa1−xAs composition at a series of InxGa1−xAs/InyGa1-yAs heterointerfaces such that a “critical composition difference” is not exceeded at each heterointerface. High resolution x-ray diffraction analysis was used to determine the extent of relaxation in each layer of these multilayer systems. As evidenced by cross-sectional TEM analysis, dislocations propagate only in the underlying material at each heterointerface for suitably selected compositional differences which results in the top InxGa1−xAs layer in such multiple layer schemes having a low dislocation density. It is to be noted that conventional methods for blocking dislocations such as strained layer superlattices and compositionally graded layers were not employed in our multilayer systems.