GaN films have been grown on SiC substrates with an AlN nucleation layer by using a metal organic chemical vapor deposition technique. Micro-cracking of the GaN films has been observed in some of the grown samples. In order to investigate the micro-cracking and microstructure, the samples have been studied using various characterization techniques such as optical microscopy, atomic force microscopy, Raman spectroscopy, scanning electron microscopy and transmission electron microscopy (TEM). The surface morphology of the AlN nucleation layer is related to the stress evolution in subsequent overgrown GaN epilayers. It is determined via TEM evidence that, if the AlN nucleation layer has a rough surface morphology, this leads to tensile stresses in the GaN films, which finally results in cracking. Raman spectroscopy results also suggest this, by showing the existence of considerable tensile residual stress in the AlN nucleation layer. Based on these various observations and results, conclusions or propositions relating to the microstructure are presented.

A technique of controlling growth gas flow rate for adjusting crystal resistivity is presented in this paper. The experimental results showed that high growth gas flow rate could affect SiC crystal resistivity remarkably. The SiC crystal resistivity would get higher and higher with increasing growth gas flow rate. The purifying effect of gas flow rate was contributing to resistivity increase at a relatively low flow rate range. As for the high gas flow rate, increase of resistivity might be explained by the well-known site competition effect. Then, one explanation for reducing nitrogen content in the crystal via increasing gas flow rate was put forward. Namely, the Si component in the gas species may more easily go through the graphite crucible at the initial stage to make the growth ambient C-rich when the gas flow rate is ∼800 sccm or more and hence suppress nitrogen incorporation into carbon site to increase crystal resistivity. This result is very helpful to grow high purity high resistivity SiC ingots.

We reported the surface morphology and electrical property of super-thin Pt films, ∼2 nm thick, deposited on 6H-SiC (0001) substrates and subsequently annealed from 400 to 1000 °C. The surfaces of the films were found to have a feature of islands growth, and the sizes of the islands increased with increasing annealing temperature. Free carbon, produced by selective reactions between Pt and SiC, diffused toward the top surface across the product layers due to low solubility and composition gradient of carbon throughout the reaction zone. A dramatic change of electrical conductivity of the films was observed. A mechanism analysis reveals that the origin came from the contribution of aggregation of islands on the surface and formation of Pt silicides and a thin layer of crystalline graphite.

Crystal structure of 4H-SiC was refined from room-temperature X-ray powder diffraction data using the Rietveld refinement method. The refined lattice constants were determined to be a=b=3.079 93(0) Å, c=10.082 22(2) Å, and the refined overall temperature factor B=0.383(3) Å2. Using the Debye approximation, the Debye temperature was successfully determined to be 1194.8 K.

Les hautes propriétés spécifiques des matériaux composites à matrice d'alliage de titane renforcée unidirectionnellement par des filaments de carbure de silicium permettent d'envisager leur emploi pour des applications aéronautiques. Après une brève description des constituants et du mode d'élaboration, les principaux mécanismes d'endommagement sont présentés. Les ruptures de filaments sont observées dans le cas d'une sollicitation longitudinale tandis que la rupture de l'interface est mise en évidence dans le cas d'une sollicitation transverse. Diverses approches multiéchelles destinées au dimensionnement de pièces en composite SiC/Ti sont ensuite envisagées. Une analyse basée sur la description du mécanisme de rupture des filaments permet d'estimer la contrainte à la rupture dans le cas d'une sollicitation longitudinale. Une méthode de transformation de champ permet d'obtenir une loi de comportement prenant en compte les contraintes résiduelles de fabrication. Elle est utilisée pour le calcul d'un disque de compresseur de turboréacteur renforcé circonférentiellement par un composite SiC/Ti.

A review of structural materials choices under irradiation in fusion environments is presented. Results on the neutron source term and the intensities in the structural materials as a function of pulse time, energy, and protection is given. The role of multiscale modeling for understanding the basic physics in irradiated materials is explained, and simulations of metals under pulse irradiation and SiC are reported.

We report on the fabrication and characterization of GaN/4H-SiC n-p-n heterojunction bipolar transistors (HBTs). The device structure consists of an n-SiC collector, p-SiC base, and selectively grown n-GaN emitter. The HBTs were grown using metalorganic chemical vapor deposition on SiC substrates. Selective GaN growth through a SiO2 mask was used to avoid damage that would be caused by reactive ion etching. In this report, we demonstrate common base transistor operation with a modest dc current gain of 15 at room temperature and 3 at 300°C.

The luminescent properties of AlGaN epitaxial layers with AlN mole fractions up to 30% and various types of AlGaN/GaN-based heterostructures have been studied. The structures were grown on 6H-SiC substrates by MOCVD. The structures' cathodoluminescence and electroluminescence were measured. A “blue” shift of the edge luminescent peak position for AlGaN alloys was measured to be a non-linear function on the AlN mole fraction. For p-AlGaN/n-GaN double heterostructures (DH), the edge peak position was detected at 365 nm (300K). For a p-Al0.05Ga0.95N/n-Al0.03Ga0.97N heterostructure, the electroluminescent edge peak was observed at 355 nm (300K). The effects of temperature and forward current on the edge electroluminescence of theAlGaN/GaN DH's were investigated.