Some key features of the Ga/sub 1-x/In/sub x/As surface reactivity to phosphorus

Summary form only given. When growing epitaxial heterostructures involving both arsenic and phosphorus based III-V semiconductors (for instance GaInAs/InP or GaAs/GaInP), the most common recipe used to reduce anion intermixing is to perform a growth interruption during which the GaInAs or GaAs surface is exposed to phosphorus before the growth of InP or GaInP. This kind of procedure then raises the question of the reactivity of an arsenide surface to a phosphorus flux in order to optimize the growth interruption. However, if some results do exist related to the behavior of a GaAs surface exposed to phosphorus, very few are reported on the reactivity of the InAs surface. In this context, we have studied the surface reactivity of Ga/sub 1-x/In/sub x/As alloys to a phosphorus flux. Samples are grown by gas source molecular beam epitaxy (GSMBE). Surface reconstruction and morphology are followed 'in-situ' by reflection high energy electron diffraction (RHEED) and 'ex-situ' by atomic force microscopy (AFM). The surface chemistry of some samples has been determined by X-ray photoelectron spectroscopy (XPS) in a vacuum chamber connected under UHV to the growth chamber.