Investigation of the process of reactive ion-beam sputtering of gallium arsenide using optical emission spectroscopy

The aim of this work was to study the process of reactive ion-beam sputtering of gallium arsenide using optical emission analysis of plasma in the target region to determine the optimal conditions for the formation of intrinsic GaAs oxides. The ion source was a plasmatron based on an anode layer accelerator (UAS), which generated a stream of accelerated argon and oxygen ions with an energy of 400–1200 eV. The target was made from tellurium doped gallium arsenide. Intense GaI lines (2874.2 Å, 2943.6 Å, 4033.0 Å and 4172.1 Å), atomic argon ArI, argon ions, and also FeI lines were detected in the spectrum upon sputtering of GaAs by Ar+ ions. The appearance of iron lines can be explained by the sputtering of the pole tips of the magnetic system of the ion source. An increase in the accelerating voltage from 1 to 3 kV leads to an increase in the intensity of the peaks of atomic gallium GaI (4172.1 Å) by 2.38 times, the GaI line (4033.0 Å) by 3.25 times, the GaI line (2943.6 Å) 3.4 times, GaI lines (2874.2 Å) 5 times. It was found that an increase in the partial pressure of oxygen leads to a sharp decrease in the peaks of GaI (4033.0 Å) and GaI (4172.1 Å) due to the chemical interaction of gallium and oxygen. Sputtering in pure oxygen reduces the intensity of these peaks by 8 and 5 times, respectively. The intensities of the peaks of atomic gallium GaI (2874.2 Å) and GaI (2943.6 Å) decreased in 2 and 1.78 times, respectively. In the presence of a positive potential on the target, the intensity of all lines of atomic gallium monotonically decreases with increasing potential. In the emission spectrum, lines of atomic oxygen OI (7774.2 Å) and molecular positive ions O+2 (6418.7 Å, 6026.4 Å, 5631.9 Å and 5295.7 Å) were detected. In the presence of a positive potential on the target, a monotonic decrease in the intensity of the above oxygen lines was observed. This indicates an intensification of chemical interaction of oxygen with target elements and, accordingly, a decrease in the free active oxygen particles