The Crystalline Structure of Thin Bismuth Layers Grown on Silicon (111) Substrates

Bismuth films with thicknesses between 6 and ∼30 nm were grown on Si (111) substrate by molecular beam epitaxy (MBE). Two main phases of bismuth — α-Bi and β-Bi — were identified from high-resolution X-ray diffraction (XRD) measurements. The crystal structure dependencies on the layer thicknesses of these films were analyzed. β-Bi layers were epitaxial and homogenous in lateral regions that are greater than 200 nm despite the layer thickness. Further, an increase in in-plane 2θ values showed the biaxial compressive strain. For comparison, α-Bi layers are misoriented in six in-plane directions and have β-Bi inserts in thicker layers. That leads to smaller (about 60 nm) lateral crystallites which are compressively strained in all three directions. Raman measurement confirmed the XRD results. The blue-sift of Raman signals compared with bulk Bi crystals occurs due to the phonon confinement effect, which is larger in the thinnest α-Bi layers due to higher compression.