Photoelectrochemical (PEC) water splitting is a promising approach to directly convert solar energy to renewable and storable hydrogen. However, the very low photovoltage and serious corrosion of semiconductor photoelectrodes in strongly acidic or alkaline electrolytes needed for water splitting severely impede the practical application of this technology. In this work, we demonstrate a facile approach to fabricate a high-photovoltage, stable photoanode by depositing Ni(OH)(2) cocatalyst on cubic silicon carbide (3C-SiC), followed by aging in 1.0 M NaOH at room temperature for 40 h without applying electrochemical bias. The aged 3C-SiC/Ni(OH)(2) photoanode achieves a record-high photovoltage of 1.10 V, an ultralow onset potential of 0.10 V vs the reversible hydrogen electrode, and enhanced stability for PEC water splitting in the strongly alkaline solution (pH = 13.6). This aged photoanode also exhibits excellent in-air stability, demonstrating identical PEC water-splitting performance for more than 400 days. We find that the aged Ni(OH)2 dramatically promotes the hole transport at the photoanode/electrolyte interface, thus significantly enhancing the photovoltage and overall PEC performance. Furthermore, the oxygen evolution reaction (OER) activity and the phase transitions of the Ni(OH)(2) electrocatalyst before and after aging are systematically investigated. We find that the aging process is critical for the formation of the relatively stable and highly active Fe-doped beta-NiOOH, which accounts for the enhanced OER activity and stability of the PEC water splitting. This work provides a simple and effective approach to fabricate high-photovoltage and stable photoanodes, bringing new premise toward solar fuel development.

We present a comparative study of the C-face and Si-face of 3C-SiC(111) grown on off-oriented 4H-SiC substrates by the sublimation epitaxy. By the lateral enlargement method, we demonstrate that the high-quality bulk-like C-face 3C-SiC with thickness of ~1 mm can be grown over a large single domain without double positioning boundaries (DPBs), which are known to have a strongly negative impact on the electronic properties of the material. Moreover, the C-face sample exhibits a smoother surface with one unit cell height steps while the surface of the Si-face sample exhibits steps twice as high as on the C-face due to step-bunching. High-resolution XRD and low temperature photoluminescence measurements show that C-face 3C-SiC can reach the same high crystalline quality as the Si-face 3C-SiC. Furthermore, cross-section studies of the C- and Si-face 3C-SiC demonstrate that in both cases an initial homoepitaxial 4H-SiC layer followed by a polytype transition layer are formed prior to the formation and lateral expansion of 3C-SiC layer. However, the transition layer in the C-face sample is extending along the step-flow direction less than that on the Si-face sample, giving rise to a more fairly consistent crystalline quality 3C-SiC epilayer over the whole sample compared to the Si-face 3C-SiC where more defects appeared on the surface at the edge. This facilitates the lateral enlargement of 3C-SiC growth on hexagonal SiC substrates.

300 μm thick 3C-SiC epilayer was grown on off-axis 4H-SiC(0001) substrate with a high growth rate of 1 mm/hour. Dry oxidation, wet oxidation and N2O anneal were applied to fabricate lateral MOS capacitors on these 3C-SiC layers. MOS interface obtained by N2O anneal has the lowest interface trap density of 3~4x1011 eV-1cm-2. Although all MOS capacitors still have positive net charges at the MOS interface, the wet oxidised sample has the lowest effective charge density of ~9.17x1011 cm-2.

One of the ways to use graphene in field effect transistors is to introduce a band gap by quantum confinement effect. That is why narrow graphene nanoribbons (GNRs) with width less than 50 nm are considered to be essential components in future graphene electronics. The growth of graphene on sidewalls of SiC(0001) mesa structures using scalable photolithography was shown to produce high quality GNRs with excellent transport properties. Such epitaxial graphene nanoribbons are very important in fundamental science but if GNRs are supposed to be used in advanced nanoelectronics, high quality thin (<50 nm) nanoribbons should be produced on a large (wafer) scale. Here we present a technique for scalable template growth of high quality GNRs on Si-face of SiC(0001) and provide detailed structural information along with transport properties. For the first time we succeeded now to avoid SiC-facet instabilities in order to grow high quality GNRs along both [11̅00] and [112̅0] crystallographic directions on the same substrate. The quality of the grown nanoribbons was confirmed by comprehensive characterization with atomic resolution STM, dark field LEEM, and transport measurements. This approach generates an entirely new platform for both fundamental and application driven research of quasi one-dimensional carbon based magnetism and spintronics.

Boron (B) has the potential for generating an intermediate band in cubic silicon carbide (3C-SiC), turning this material into a highly efficient absorber for single-junction solar cells. The formation of a delocalized band demands high concentration of the foreign element, but the precipitation behavior of B in the 3C polymorph of SiC is not well known. Here, probe-corrected scanning transmission electron microscopy and secondary-ion mass spectrometry are used to investigate precipitation mechanisms in B-implanted 3C-SiC as a function of temperature. Point-defect clustering was detected after annealing at 1273 K, while stacking faults, B-rich precipitates and dislocation networks developed in the 1573 - 1773 K range. The precipitates adopted the rhombohedral B13C2 structure and trapped B up to 1773 K. Above this temperature, higher solubility reduced precipitation and free B diffused out of the implantation layer. Dopant concentrations E19 at.cm-3 were achieved at 1873 K.

Multilayer graphene has exhibited distinct electronic properties such as the tunable bandgap for optoelectronic applications. Among all graphene growth techniques, thermal decomposition of SiC is regarded as a promising method for production of device-quality graphene. However, it is still very challenging to grow uniform graphene over a large-area, especially multilayer graphene. One of the main obstacles is the occurrence of step bunching on the SiC surface, which significantly influences the formation process and the uniformity of the multilayer graphene. In this work, we have systematically studied the growth of monolayer and multilayer graphene on off-axis 3CSiC(111). Taking advantage of the synergistic effect of periodic SiC step edges as graphene nucleation sites and the unique thermal decomposition energy of 3CSiC steps, we demonstrate that the step bunching can be fully eliminated during graphene growth and large-area monolayer, bilayer, and four-layer graphene can be controllably obtained on high-quality off-axis 3CSiC(111) surface. The low energy electron microscopy results demonstrate that a uniform four-layer graphene has been grown over areas of tens of square micrometers, which opens the possibility to tune the bandgap for optoelectronic devices. Furthermore, a model for graphene growth along with the step bunching elimination is proposed.

Silicon carbide (SiC) surface cleaning and etching (wet, electrochemical, thermal) are important technological processes in preparation of SiC wafers for crystal growth, defect analysis or device processing. While removal of organic, particulate and metallic contaminants by chemical cleaning is a routine process in research and industrial production, the etching which, in addition to structural defects analysis, can also be used to modify wafer surface structure, is very interesting for development of innovative device concepts. In this book chapter we review SiC chemical cleaning and etching procedures and present perspectives of SiC etching for new device development.

Sublimation-grown 3C-SiC crystals were implanted with B ions at elevated temperature (400 °C) using multiple energies (100 to 575 keV) with a total dose of 1.3×1017 atoms/cm2 in order to form intermediate band (IB) in 3C-SiC. The samples were then annealed at 1400 °C for 60 min. An anomalous area in the center was observed in the PL emission pattern. The SIMS analysis indicated that the B concentration was the same both within and outside the anomalous area. The buried boron box-like concentration profile can reach ~3×1021 cm-3 in the plateau region. In the anomalous area a broad emission band (possible IB) emerges at around ~1.7-1.8 eV, which may be associated with B-precipitates having a sufficiently high density.

Sublimation-grown 3C-SiC crystals were implanted with 2 atomic percent of boron ions at elevated temperature (400 °C) using multiple energies (100 to 575 keV) with a total dose of 8.5×10¹⁶ atoms/cm². The samples were then annealed at 1400, 1500 and 1600 °C for 1h at each temperature. The buried boron box-like concentration profile can reach ~2×10²¹ cm^-3 in the plateau region. The optical activity of the incorporated boron atoms was deduced from the evolution in absorption and emission spectra, indicating possible pathway for achieving an intermediate band behavior in boron doped 3C-SiC at sufficiently high dopant concentrations.                    

In this work we present a significant advancement in cubic silicon carbide (3C-SiC) growth in terms of crystal quality and domain size, and indicate its potential use in photovoltaics. To date, the use of 3C-SiC for photovoltaics has not been considered due to the band gap of 2.3 eV being too large for conventional solar cells. Doping of 3C-SiC with boron introduces an energy level of 0.7 eV above the valence band. Such energy level may form an intermediate band (IB) in the band gap. This IB concept has been presented in the literature to act as an energy ladder that allows absorption of sub-bandgap photons to generate extra electron-hole pairs and increase the efficiency of a solar cell. The main challenge with this concept is to find a materials system that could realize such efficient photovoltaic behavior. The 3C-SiC bandgap and boron energy level fits nicely into the concept, but has not been explored for an IB behavior. For a long time crystalline 3C-SiC has been challenging to grow due to its metastable nature. The material mainly consists of a large number of small domains if the 3C polytype is maintained. In our work a crystal growth process was realized by a new approach that is a combination of initial nucleation and step-flow growth. In the process, the domains that form initially extend laterally to make larger 3C-SiC domains, thus leading to a pronounced improvement in crystalline quality of 3C-SiC. In order to explore the feasibility of IB in 3C-SiC using boron, we have explored two routes of introducing boron impurities; ion implantation on un-doped samples and epitaxial growth on un-doped samples using pre-doped source material. The results show that 3C-SiC doped with boron is an optically active material, and thus is interesting to be further studied for IB behavior. For the ion implanted samples the crystal quality was maintained even after high implantation doses and subsequent annealing. The same was true for the samples grown with pre-doped source material, even with a high concentration of boron impurities. We present optical emission and absorption properties of as-grown and boron implanted 3C-SiC. The low-temperature photoluminescence spectra indicate the formation of optically active deep boron centers, which may be utilized for achieving an IB behavior at sufficiently high dopant concentrations. We also discuss the potential of boron doped 3C-SiC base material in a broader range of applications, such as in photovoltaics, biomarkers and hydrogen generation by splitting water. (C) 2015 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.