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AssigneesThe University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, North Carolina State University
InventorsBrian R. Stoner, Jeffrey T. Glass, William M. Hooke, Bradley E. Williams
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A method and apparatus for enhancing the nucleation of diamond by pretreating a substrate by electrically biasing a diamond film adjacent the substrate while exposing the substrate and the thus biased diamond film to a carbon-containing plasma. The bias pretreatment may be maintained for a time period in the range of about 1 hour to 2 hours to achieve a high diamond nucleation density. Alternatively, the biasing may be continued until diamond film formation is indicated by a change in reflectivity of the surface of the substrate. The biasing pretreating may be used to nucleate diamond heteroepitaxially on a substrate having a surface film formed of a material having a relatively close lattice match to diamond, such as .beta.-silicon carbide. The apparatus includes a laser reflection interferometer to monitor the surface of the substrate. The laser reflection interferometer is used to monitor growth of the diamond film and cooperates with a controller to control the processing parameters during the diamond growing process.
A method for pretreating a substrate for the growth of a diamond film thereon, the method comprising the steps of:
A method for pretreating a substrate for the growth of a heteroepitaxial diamond film thereon, the method comprising the steps of:
A method for forming a diamond film on a mirror finish substrate, said method comprising the steps of:
Dependencies are inferred from the claim text.