Graphene formation on SiC substrates

TL;DR

This paper reports on the synthesis of graphene on SiC substrates using high vacuum chemical vapor deposition, detailing surface preparation, morphology, and electronic properties of the resulting graphene layers.

Contribution

It introduces a new method for H2 etching of SiC substrates and demonstrates successful graphene formation with detailed morphological and electronic characterization.

Findings

Graphene was successfully formed on SiC substrates confirmed by Raman spectroscopy.

Surface morphology was significantly altered during graphene growth, with steps up to 15 nm high.

Electronic measurements showed favorable mobility and carrier concentrations.

Abstract

Graphene layers were created on both C and Si faces of semi-insulating, on-axis, 4H- and 6H-SiC substrates. The process was performed under high vacuum (<10-4 mbar) in a commercial chemical vapor deposition SiC reactor. A method for H2 etching the on-axis sub-strates was developed to produce surface steps with heights of 0.5 nm on the Si-face and 1.0 to 1.5 nm on the C-face for each polytype. A process was developed to form graphene on the substrates immediately after H2 etching and Raman spectroscopy of these samples confirmed the formation of graphene. The morphology of the graphene is described. For both faces, the underlying substrate morphology was significantly modified during graphene formation; sur-face steps were up to 15 nm high and the uniform step morphology was sometimes lost. Mo-bilities and sheet carrier concentrations derived from Hall Effect measurements on large area (16 mm square) and small area (2 and 10 um square) samples are presented and shown to compare favorably to recent reports.