Growth and structural characterization of semiconducting Ru2Si3

Recent band structure calculations indicate that ruthenium silicide (Ru2Si3 ) is semiconducting with a direct band gap. Electrical measurements lead to a band gap around 0.8 eV which is technologically important for fiber comm unications. This makes Ru2Si3 a promising candidate for silicon based optic al devices, namely LEDs. We present first results on the epitaxial growth o f ruthenium silicide films on Si(1 0 0) and Si(1 1 1) fabricated by the tem plate method, a special molecular beam epitaxy technique. Orientational rel ationships on Si(1 1 1) have been determined. We characterized the films by Rutherford Backscattering and Channeling, X-ray diffraction and transmissi on electron microscopy. (C) 1999 Elsevier Science B.V. All rights reserved.