Estimation of Solid-Vapor Distribution Coefficients in Organometallic Vapor Phase Epitaxy of II-VI Semiconductors.

An understanding of the relationship between chemical vapor deposition process parameters such as stoichiometry, temmperature and pressure and the properties of the resulting solid thin films is critical to the ability to produce high quality II- VI semiconductor materials. In this work, we use equilibrium thermodynamics to explain non-linear alloy incorporation in the Organometallic Vapor Phase Epitaxy of ternary II-VI compounds such as ZnSe sub x S sub 1-x and Hg sub 1-x Cd sub x Te. Our analysis includes the effects of incomplete decomposition of gas phase reactants as well as non-ideal solution effects in the product film. As an extension of our discussion of the specific II-VI systems above, we derive general formulas which can be applied to any OMVPE system for the limiting cases of complete or absent anion reactant decomposition.