An investigation was made of the early stages of Si growth on 3C-type samples. It was found that adsorbed Si atoms on the surface formed elongated islands that were 2 to 3μm long and were parallel to the <110> direction. This coincided with that of the dimer rows, on the surface, which were terminated by Si atoms The formation of the anisotropic islands could be explained by assuming an anisotropic diffusion constant for Si adatoms on a 3C-type surface. A novel method for observing antiphase domains, by exploiting this characteristic of Si island growth, was proposed. The validity of the method was confirmed by comparing the results with those obtained using the NaOH etching method.

Elongated Shaped Si Island Formation on 3C-SiC by Chemical Vapor Deposition and Its Application to Antiphase Domain Observation. Y.Ishida, T.Takahashi, H.Okumura, T.Sekigawa, S.Yoshida: Japanese Journal of Applied Physics - 1, 1999, 38[6A], 3470-4