Growth and characterization of epitaxial cubic boron nitride films on silicon

Abstract

We report the growth of boron nitride films on (001) faces of silicon using the method of pulsed-excimer-laser ablation. The structure of the deposited films is cubic zinc blende with a lattice constant of 3.619 \AA{}. The films were found to be heteroepitaxial with the cubic BN〈100〉 axes parallel to Si〈100〉, as characterized by x-ray diffraction and high-resolution transmission electron microscopy. We find evidence for an unusual 3:2 commensurate lattice matching.