In0.44Ga0.56As (3% mismatch) films 3 mu m thick were grown simultaneously o
n a conventional GaAs substrate, glass-bonded GaAs compliant substrates emp
loying glasses of different viscosity, and a twist-bonded GaAs compliant su
bstrate. High-resolution triple-crystal x-ray diffraction measurements of t
he breadth of the strain distribution in the films and atomic force microsc
opy measurements of the film's surface morphology were performed. The films
grown on the glass-bonded compliant substrates exhibited a strain distribu
tion whose breadth was narrowed by almost a factor of 2 and a surface rough
ness that decreased by a factor of 4 compared to the film simultaneously gr
own on the conventional substrate. These improvements in the film's structu
ral quality were observed to be independent of the viscosity of the glass-b
onding media over the range of viscosity investigated and were not observed
to occur for the film grown on the twist-bonded substrate. (C) 1999 Americ
an Institute of Physics. [S0003-6951(99)01637-X].