The diffusion of Mn was carried out in sealed quartz ampoules, using 4 types of Mn source. These were: solid crystalline Mn grains, Mn3As, MnAs, and Mn thin films on GaAs substrates. It was found that only MnAs led to the formation of a smooth GaAs surface and a uniform dopant distribution. In the case of the other sources, interactions between the source materials and the substrate gave rise to poor surface morphologies and inhomogeneous distributions. In the case of diffusion at 800C, surface p-type carrier concentrations of the order of 1020/cm3 were obtained. The diffusion profiles which were determined by using capacitance-voltage techniques resembled those which were obtained for Zn diffusion. It was suggested that a substitutional-interstitial mechanism was the predominant one. It was also noted that layer disordering could be produced in AlGaAs-GaAs superlattices by Mn impurities.

C.H.Wu, K.C.Hsieh, G.E.Höfler, N.El-Zein, N.Holonyak: Applied Physics Letters, 1991, 59[10], 1224-6