Deposition of aluminum nitride thin films by MOCVD from the trimethylaluminum-ammonia adduct

Growth of epitaxial ALN from a directly bonded compound in the absence of any NH3, as described here, is an important technological advance. It is reported that the use of the adduct Me(3)AlNH(3) as a single-source precursor has allowed the epitaxial growth on sapphire of AlN films of a quality suitable for buffer layers in the growth of device layers avoiding the disadvantages of traditional MOCVD of AlN. Details are given of deposition schemes, the carbon and oxygen contamination is discussed, and a probable deposition mechanism is proposed.