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We report on strain analysis by nano-beam electron diffraction with a spatial resolution of 0.5nm and a strain precision in the 4–710−4 range. Series of up to 160000 CBED patterns have been acquired in STEM mode with a semi-convergence angle of the incident probe of 2.6mrad, which enhances the spatial resolution by a factor of 5 compared to nearly parallel illumination. Firstly, we summarise 3 different algorithms to detect CBED disc positions accurately: selective edge detection and circle fitting, radial gradient maximisation and cross-correlation with masks. They yield equivalent strain profiles in growth direction for a stack of 5 InxGa1−xNyAs1−y/GaAs layers with tensile and compressive strain. Secondly, we use a direct electron read-out pnCCD detector with ultrafast readout hardware and a quantum efficiency close to 1 both to show that the same strain profiles are obtained at 200 times higher readout rates of 1kHz and to enhance strain precision to 3.510−4 by recording the weak 008 disc.

In this contribution, the indium concentration profile of an InxGa1−xN/GaN five-fold multi quantum well structure is measured from high-angle annular dark field scanning transmission electron microscopy (HAADF-STEM) images. The results are compared with an atom probe tomography study. Indium concentrations in the range of 26 at.% to 33 at.% are measured in the centre of the quantum wells. An additional indium layer of 14 at.% has been found on top of the quantum wells. In the second part, the temperature dependence of measured intensities in GaN is investigated. Here, multislice calculations in the frozen lattice approximation are carried out in dependence of specimen thickness and compared to experimental data. An increase of intensity with specimen temperature is found.

High-angle annular dark field scanning transmission electron microscopy has been successfully used for composition evaluation in various material systems. In this work, the quantitative applicability of this method to GeSi/Si heterostructures was studied. Reference images were simulated by frozen lattice multislice simulations for different Ge concentrations accounting for static atomic displacements and biaxial strain due to pseudomorphic growth. Specimen thickness and composition are obtained by comparison of simulated and normalised experimental intensities. The measured thickness of a pure Si wedge specimen is compared to thickness determined from Pendell?sung fringes in dark field micrographs. The deviation is below 10 nm coinciding with the accuracy of prior works. The composition of a GeSi-layer structure was measured in a calibration sample of known concentration and good agreement is found. Two-dimensional concentration maps of a GeSi/Si transistor structure were created. Measured concentrations agree with nominal values. However, strain fields in the Si lead to a variation of the image intensity causing an artificial fluctuation of the measured concentrations of ?4%.

We report growth of Ge nano/micro structures on ultra clean, high vicinal silicon surfaces of Si(5 5 7) and Si(5 5 12) under two substrate heating conditions: direct current (DC) and radiative heating (RH). These were grown under ultra high vacuum conditions while keeping the substrate at a temperature of 600°C. The results for 10 monolayer (ML) and 12 ML thick Ge deposited on the above surfaces show spherical island structures for RH conditions while aligned trapezoidal structures were observed under DC conditions of heating. We find that the longer side of trapezoid structures are along irrespective of DC current direction. In the case of 10 ML Ge deposited on Si (5 5 7), elongated SixGe1−x nanostructures with an average length of ≈300 nm and a length/width ratio of ≈3.3 have been formed along the step edges. Under similar conditions for 10 ML Ge growth on Si(5 5 12), we found aligned SixGe1−x trapezoidal microstructures of length ≈6.25 μm and an aspect ratio of ≈3.0. Scanning transmission electron microscopy (STEM) measurements showed the mixing of Ge and Si at the interface and throughout the over-layer. Detailed electron microscopy studies (scanning electron microscopy (SEM) and STEM) reveal the structural aspects of these microstructures.

In this contribution we have studied the diffusion of Al in AlAs/GaAs distributed Bragg-reflectors using the high angle annular dark field (HAADF) scanning transmission electron microscopy (STEM) intensity. The measured intensity is normalized to the intensity of the incoming electron beam using a detector scan. The normalized intensity can be directly compared with a set of frozen lattice simulations yielding specimen thickness in regions with known composition or concentration in regions with known thickness. The thickness was evaluated both from GaAs and AlAs regions yielding that the specimen was about 15 nm thinner in AlAs regions due to oxidation. For the concentration evaluation the thickness was derived from GaAs regions and concentrations up to 1.2 were found due to the overestimated thickness. Concentration profiles were scaled down to 1.0 and fitted to the solution of Fick's laws.

In this contribution we compare optical and structural properties of In0.2Ga0.8N0.024As0.976 quantum wells before and after annealing at 550 °C and 600 °C in an N2 atmosphere. We measure strain and chemically sensitive contrast to determine local indium and nitrogen concentrations using a TEM 3-beam image formed by the 000, 220 and 200 beams. For quantification of the concentrations Bloch wave simulations are used, which include bonding and static atomic displacements. The samples were grown by metal-organic vapour phase epitaxy, prepared with focused ion beams (FIB), thinned with low energy ion milling and investigated in a Cs-corrected Titan 80/300 microscope using an L-shaped objective aperture. Imaging conditions with the Laue circle centre at (0 4.2 0) are used as they show a weak dependence on the lamella thickness. Absorption measurements show a blueshift of the band gap of 19 ± 7meV (550 °C) and 36 ± 7 meV (600 °C) after annealing. The average nitrogen concentration was found to be 2±1% and is unaffected by the annealing temperature. In contrast, the mean indium concentration appears to decrease from 18.5 ± 2% before to 15 ± 1% after annealing. Together with the blueshift, this observation is discussed in terms of a modification of electron structure factors, caused by preferred coordination of N to In atoms.

We report on a Transmission Electron Microscopy 3-beam technique based on the interference of 000, 200 and 220. Nonlinear imaging artefacts are eliminated by Fourier filtering, yielding 200 and 220 lattice fringe images, from which chemically sensitive contrast and strain are measured, respectively. In this way, In and N composition can be mapped at atomic scale in quaternary InGaNAs by comparison with simulated reference data. Our Bloch wave simulations are based on structure factors derived from supercells with 106 atoms, which have been strain-relaxed by valence force field methods. Additionally, the influence of electron redistributions due to chemical bonding is accounted for by modified atomic scattering amplitudes derived from density functional theory. By comparing local compositions in an annealed In0.28Ga0.72N0.025As0.975 sample with its as-grown counterpart, we find homogenisation of InGaNAs layer thickness and –stoichiometry upon annealing.

Investigation of composition in InGaN quantum wells and quantum dots by TEM is hampered by formation of electron beam induced agglomeration of indium, which occurs if the specimen is exposed to the electron beam for a few minutes. In this contribution we demonstrate that compositional analysis of InGaN nanostructures is possible without this artifact if STEM Z-contrast imaging is applied instead of parallel beam illumination. The suggested method for composition analysis in InGaN is based on a comparison of intensity normalized with respect to the incident electron beam with simulated image intensity. Simulations are performed with the STEMsim program using the frozen lattice multislice approximation for which static atomic displacements were taken into account.

In this work we show how the indium concentration in high indium content InxGa1-xN quantum wells, as they are commonly used in blue and green light emitting diodes, can be deduced from high-angle annular dark-field scanning transmission electron microscopy (HAADF-STEM) images. This method bases on introducing normalized intensities which can be compared with multislice simulations to determine the specimen thickness or the indium concentration. The evaluated concentrations are compared with atom probe tomography measurements. It is also demonstrated how the quality of focused ion beam prepared TEM- lamellas can be improved by an additional etching with low energy ions.

The effect of strain, composition and disorder in ADF images is systematically studied as a function of detection angle in order to understand the main contrast mechanisms. We demonstrate that the complex phenomenology in ADF images can be accounted for by accurate simulations and modelling. The advantage of an accurate modelling on the image interpretation will be demonstrated in the case of dislocations, chemical analysis of InGaP/GaAs and most noticeably the measurement of both In and N content in quaternary InGaAsN.

We determine the nitrogen concentration of GaN0.01≤x≤0.05As1−x quantum wells by evaluation of high resolution scanning transmission electron microscopy (STEM) images using a high-angle annular dark field detector. Although nitrogen has a smaller atomic number than Ga the image intensity increases with the nitrogen content. This is explained by the influence of static atomic displacements by comparison with frozen lattice simulations. The resulting nitrogen concentrations agree with high resolution X-ray diffraction measurements and strain state analysis applied to STEM images.

Transmission electron microscopy (TEM) was applied to study In segregation during molecular beam epitaxy (MBE) growth of InAs-based quantum-dot (QD) structures with a focus on achieving QD luminescence at the technologically relevant wavelength of 1.3 μm. Quantitative composition analyses were carried out with the composition evaluation by lattice fringe analysis (CELFA) technique and In-segregation efficiencies were determined on the basis of atomic-scale composition profiles. The effect of the InAs-deposition rate on the In distribution was studied in detail which needs to be low, in the 0.005 ML/s regime to achieve long-wavelength emission. Further minimization of In-segregation induced intermixing can be achieved by lowering the substrate temperature during GaAs cap layer growth. Finally, a procedure is presented to extract the real composition of QDs taking into account their three-dimensional morphology and embedding in a GaAs cap layer.

The atomic scattering amplitudes of the various atoms of the systems Ga1−xInxAs, GaAs1−xNx and InAs1−xNx are calculated using the density functional theory (DFT) approach. The scattering amplitudes of N, Ga, As and In in the model systems are compared with the frequently used Doyle and Turner values. Deviation from the latter values is found for small scattering vectors (s

Catalyst- and mask-free grown GaN nanorods have been investigated using transmission electron microscopy (TEM), scanning transmission electron microscopy (STEM) and energy filtered transmission electron microscopy (EFTEM). The nanorods were grown on nitridated r-plane sapphire substrates in a molecular beam epitaxy reactor. We investigated samples directly after the nitridation and after the overgrowth of the structure with GaN. High resolution transmission electron microscopy (HRTEM) and EFTEM revealed that AlN islands have formed due to nitridation. After overgrowth, the AlN islands could not be observed any more, neither by EFTEM nor by Z-contrast imaging. Instead, a smooth layer consisting of AlGaN was found. The investigation of the overgrown sample revealed that an a-plane GaN layer and GaN nanorods on top of the a-plane GaN have formed. The nanorods reduced from top of the a-plane GaN towards the a-plane GaN/sapphire interface suggesting that the nanorods originate at the AlN islands found after nitridation. However, this could not be shown unambiguously. The number of threading dislocations in the nanorods was very low. The analysis of the epitaxial relationship to the a-plane GaN showed that the nanorods grew along the [000-1] direction, and the [1-100] direction of the rods was parallel to the [0001] direction of the a-plane GaN.