Influence of mechanical and chemical silicon surface preparation on diamond nucleation and growth in CH4/H2 system discharge

The diamond nucleation on silicon has been a subject of different interests in previous years in order to understand and improve diamond growth. In this work, we develop a new silicon surface chemical preparation based on silicon surface passivation before plasma treatment, which stabilises the surface and so favours diamond epitaxy on silicon. This treatment allows us to remove native oxide layer and to saturate dangling bonds with H atoms. This would limit the surface reconstruction. We notice that seeding the silicon surface with diamond powder grain size of 40 mu m, following surface passivation, increases the nucleation density and so limits the graphite contribution on diamond films obtained. (C) 1998 Elsevier Science S.A.