A MODEL FOR THE BUFFER LAYER FORMED ON SILICON DURING HFCVD DIAMOND GROWTH

A gradient-stage model is proposed to describe the formation of the SiC buffer layer between a diamond film and the silicon substrate during CVD growth. Using the Keating model and minimizing the short-range bond stretching and bending potential, structural parameters were obtained which take into account a uniform strain distribution. Experimentally, X-ray photoelectron spectroscopy (XPS) and Auger electron spectroscopy (AES) were used to characterize the buffer layers during the preparation of diamond films grown on a silicon substrate by hot-filament chemical vapour deposition (HFCVD) and these results were compared to the theoretically derived model.