Thermal oxidation of 6H-SiC studied by oxygen isotopic tracing and narrow nuclear resonance profiling

We show that on SiC () (the fast-oxidizing carbon face), at 1100 °C and 100 mbar, the oxide exhibits an initial fast growth regime, followed by a constant growth rate confirming previous results that oxide growth is not limited by diffusion of the oxidizing species or reaction products through the oxide. At 1100 °C, in this linear regime, the growth rate also exhibits a linear dependence with oxygen pressure. The silicon face shows sub-linear pressure dependence. A simple oxidation model is ruled out since, on both SiC faces, sequential 16O2/18O2/16O2 oxidations show that oxygen fixed in the oxide, near the SiC/SiO2 interface moves during subsequent growth