The growth of SiGeC alloys on Si(001) in an ultra-high vacuum chemical-vapor deposition system was investigated by means of in situ reflection high-energy electron diffraction, transmission electron microscopy and high-resolution X-ray diffraction. It

was shown that, when the total amount of deposited C exceeded a value of about 1.5%, the grown layers contained a high density of stacking faults and/or micro-twins. However, such defects were found to be formed only after the deposition of a certain thickness, whose value depended upon the amount of deposited C. By realizing SiGeC/Si multilayer arrays, it was shown that defect-free SiGeC films with a substitutional C content up to 3.3% could be achieved.

Multilayer-Array Growth of SiGeC Alloys on Si(001). V.LeThanh, C.Calmes, Y.Zheng, D.Bouchier: Applied Physics Letters, 2002, 80[1], 43-5