Real-time in-situ spectroscopic ellipsometry of GaSb nanostructures during sputtering: Identification of growth regimes

Ingar S. Nerbo (1) , Sébastien Le Roy (2) , Morten Kildemo (3) , Elin Sondergard (2)

1 Physics Department
2 SVI - Surface du Verre et Interfaces
3 Physics NTNU - Department of Physics [Trondheim]

We demonstrate that in-situ spectroscopic ellipsometry can be used to measure the height evo- lution of nanostructures during low energy ion sputtering of GaSb. A graded anisotropic effective medium approximation is used to extract the height from the optical measurements. Two different growth regimes have been observed, first exponential, then followed by a linear regime. The linear regime is not expected by the traditional sputtering theories. The in-situ results correspond well to ex-situ AFM measurements.

Domaines: Science des matériaux [cond-mat.mtrl-sci]

Ingar S. Nerbo, Sébastien Le Roy, Morten Kildemo, Elin Sondergard. Real-time in-situ spectroscopic ellipsometry of GaSb nanostructures during sputtering: Identification of growth regimes. Applied Physics Letters, 2009, 94 (21), pp.213105. ⟨hal-00499356⟩