Ga adsorbate on (0001) GaN: In situ characterization with quadrupole mass spectrometry and reflection high-energy electron diffraction

We have investigated the adsorption and subsequent desorption of Ga on (0001) GaN using simultaneous line-of-sight quadrupole mass spectrometry (QMS) and reflection high-energy electron diffraction (RHEED). The in situ QMS and RHEED desorption transient measurements demonstrate the Ga flux dependent accumulation of the theoretically predicted laterally contracted Ga bilayer [J. E. Northrup , Phys. Rev. B 61, 9932 (2000)] under conditions similar to those used during GaN growth by rf-plasma molecular beam epitaxy. We correlated bioscillatory RHEED desorption transients [C. Adelmann , J. Appl. Phys. 91, 9638 (2002)] to QMS-measured Ga-adsorbate coverage and found both to be consistent with layer-by-layer desorption of the Ga-adsorbate bilayer. The QMS-measured steady-state Ga-adlayer coverage exhibited a continuous increase from 0 to 2.4 ML (monolayer) with respect to impinging Ga flux at substrate temperatures of 640-700 degrees C. We observed an exponential dependence of the Ga flux corresponding to 1.0 ML Ga-adsorbate coverage on substrate temperature and we measured an apparent activation energy of 2.43 +/- 0.11 eV and an attempt prefactor of 6.77x10(12) nm/min (4.36x10(11) Hz) for this transition. (c) 2006 American Institute of Physics