Investigation of diamond etching and growth by in situ scanning tunneling microscopy

Recently we published a new experimental set-up for the investigation of dy namic processes under diamond deposition conditions. In the present paper t he first measurements of diamond etching and growth with this set-up are pr esented. Etching experiments at 500 degrees C substrate temperature reveal no etching of the pre-grown diamond film used as sample, whereas at 530 deg rees C rapid etching of a (111)-faceted crystal and slow etching of a (100) -faceted crystal is visible. Similar, at 500 degrees C no growth could be d etected oa a boron doped (100)-single crystal, but at 530 degrees C growth was monitored with a rate comparable with that of the etching rate of the ( 100)-plane at the same substrate temperature (about 10 nm h(-1)). (C) 1999 Elsevier Science S.A. All rights reserved.