Atomic scale interface engineering for strain compensated epitaxially grown InAs/AlSb superlattices

This paper presents a systematic investigation of strain compensation schemes for InAs/AlSb superlattices (SLs) on GaSb substrates. Short growth interruptions (soak times) under varying arsenic and/or antimony beam equivalent pressures in InAs/AlSb SLs with exemplary dimensions of about ((2.4/2.4) +/- 0.2) nm were investigated to achieve strain compensation. When using uncracked As(4), strain compensation was found to be unaccomplishable unless sub-monolayer AlAs spikes were inserted at the InAs -> AlSb interface. In contrast, the supply of cracked As(2) dimers leads directly to the formation of strain compensating AlAs-like interfaces. This mechanism allows various growth sequences for strain compensated superlattices, including soak-time-free and Sb-soak-only SL growth. Each of the two latter approaches yields layers with excellent crystal quality and minimal intermixing at the heterointerfaces as verified by high resolution x-ray diffraction analysis and transmission electron microscopy.