ADVANCES IN MOVPE, MBE, AND CBE

In epitaxial growth technology, both metalorganic vapor phase epitaxy (MOVPE) and molecular beam epitaxy (MBE) have become the dominant techniques after more than two decades of development. On the horizon, it is the emerging of chemical beam epitaxy (CBE) which has been proven to be a very powerful combination of MOVPE and MBE. Very significant progress has been made in multi-wafer system designs for both MBE and MOVPE. Great success in material uniformity has been demonstrated. At present. it is fair to sav that MOVPE has dominated the growth and device applications of phosphorus containing compound semiconductors, e.g. AlGaInP and InGaAsP, and MBE has dominated over the AlGaAs. while CBE is demonstrating its unusual capabilities as a combination of both techniques and is gaining very significant momentum. For CBE, very rapid progress has been made in both AlGaAs and InGaAsP systems. State-of-the-art electronic and photonic devices have been fabricated. When future demand for compound semiconductor devices and circuits becomes substantial, without doubt, CBE will be an important player.