Angular effects on F+ etching SiC: MD study

Molecular dynamics (MD) simulations were performed to investigate F+ continuously bombarding SiC surfaces with energies of 100 eV at different incident angles at 300 K. The simulated results show that the steady-state uptake of F atoms increases with increasing incident angle. With the steady-state etching established, a Si-C-F reactive layer is formed. It is found that the etching yield of Si is greater than that of C. In the F-containing reaction layer, the SiF species is dominant with incident angles less than 30 degrees. For all incident angles, the CF species is dominant over CF2 and CF3.