Compound semiconductors form a central topic at the Institute, in particular the problems of crystal growth. Other activities concern phosphors and optical data storage materials.
The Institute has developed strong ties to industry. As will be seen below most research projects are linked to co-operations with industrial partners. In these co-operations the Institute generally covers the more fundamental aspects of the corresponding problem. In this way the Institute forms part of the general concept of the Department of Materials Science and Engineering, which defines itself as a place of basic research as well as a partner to industry. A mayor industrial activity, the company SiCrystal AG, which is a supplier of silicon carbide semiconductor material, has developed out of the Institute VI.
A completely new activity in the field of wide-gap semiconductor growth was opened by starting a project on AlN. Aim of the project is the growth of bulk material, which, so far, is an unsolved problem in the field of crystal growth.
Also the activities of the Crystal Growth Laboratory (CGL), the working group of Prof. Dr. Georg Müller, have been successfully expanded in 2001. In its traditional fields of experimental crystal growth of Silicon and III-V semiconductors as well as of fluoride crystals the R&D merits of CGL contributed to the maintenance of the market position of its industrial partners. Their confidence in CGL is evident from the fact that the co-operations were continued on the same level despite of the economic contractions of the global semiconductor market. In the field of numerical modelling of crystal growth processes CGL has considerably extended its activities. This is underlined by the fact that in 2001 more than 20 license contracts about the software products developed at CGL have been placed with world leading companies and research institutions. Furthermore, CGL has spread its activities to new research areas in 2001. For example it started to research on oxide crystal growth and on bulk growth of nitrides as well as on fundamental metallurgical problems like the influence of convection on the microstructure formation in technical aluminium alloys during solidification.

Total space: 1430 m²
Laboratory space: 1100 m², including 90 m² in the Technology Hall of the Department. 120 m² laboratory space plus office and laboratories, which belongs to the Laboratory of Crystal Growth of the "Fraunhofer Institute for Integrated Circuits".
Main Equipment
Crystal growth
·3 inductively heated reactors for SiC bulk crystal growth (T £ 2500 C; p £ 30 mbar), one of them provided with in-situ growth control by X-rays
·resistively heated high pressure (p £ 200 bar) and high temperature (T £ 2300 °C) reactor for SiC and ZnSe liquid phase growth
·2 high-pressure Czochralski pullers
·3 high-pressure multi-zone cold wall furnaces (for 2" - 6" crystal diameter, used for VGF growth of InP and VGF growth of GaAs)
·Multi zone furnace (used for growth of CaF₂ crystals)
·4 furnaces for solution growth (for 1" crystal diameter, used for growth of CuInSe₂ by THM and SBM)
·Mirror furnace (for 1" crystal diameter, used for FZ growth of GaAs)
·Several multi zone furnaces for crystal growth of small diameter crystals and tube furnaces for sample preparation
·Liquid phase epitaxy facilities
·Facility for AlN sublimation growth process
·Micro-puller for fiber growth
·HVPE (hydrogenated vapour phase epitaxy) facility for GaN
·Centrifuge for experiments under high gravity (centrifuge radius 50-120 cm, rotation speed 0-250 rpm) Analysis and characterization of materials
·Particle size analyse Beckmann-Coulter
·"Labor-Zickzacksichter Alpine AG" for production of defined powder fractions
·Scanning electron microscope, Jeol 6400
·Cathodoluminescence set to the Jeol 6400, Oxford Instr.
·Optical/infrared microscope, Reichert-Jung
·Other different optical microscopes
·Optical Set-up for photoluminescence and absorption spectroscopy of wide band gap semiconductors by a blue/uv - argon ion laser system
·Mapping system for optical spectroscopy of semiconductor wafers
·Interferometric profilometer for surface analysis of semiconductor wafers
·2 photo- and thermoluminescence systems with X-ray excitation
·Excimer laser system including dye laser and Raman shifter
·X-ray Laue camera
·Hall-measurement-system (temperature dependent 15 K-650 K)
·Laterally resolved resistivity measurements by 4-point-probe-method and spreading resistance (resolution 20 µm)
·Measurement system for characterization of deep and shallow levels by capacitance techniques (CV, DLTS) and by conductance techniques (TSC, PICTS)
·Photoluminescence system (14 K and 300 K), IR-absorption, both systems suitable for mapping
·Atomic absorption spectrometry for trace analysis
·Differential Thermal Analysis for determination of phase diagrams
·Differential Scanning Calorimeter for thermodynamic and kinetic studies
·Frequency converter (P = 90 kW, f = 1...1000 Hz)
·2 He-Temperature cryostats, T-controlled
·Closed-cylce cryostat (15 K - 320 K), T-controlled
Preparation and metallography
·Inner diameter saw and precision grinding systems (G&N, Erlangen) for wafering and surface preparation of SiC wafers
·Facilities for preparative work related to III-V compound wafer preparation (grinder, annular saws, lapping and polishing equipment)
·2 evaporation systems
·Sputtering systems (DC, 6" target diameter) Others
·Magnet for axial steady field (inner diameter 50 cm, Bmax = 0.2 T)
·2 magnets for rotating fields (inner diameter 15 cm, Bmax = 10 mT)
·Magnet system for rotating fields (variable diameter)
·Gaussmeter for magnetic induction measurements (3 axes)
·15 powerful PCs for numerical modelling

A number of scientific links have been developed in recent years with other Institutes of the Department as well as the Technical Faculty. Particularly strong connections exist to the Institute of Glass and Ceramics (including two common DFG-projects), to the Fraunhofer Institute for Integrated Circuits (Prof. Ryssel), the Institute of Fluid Mechanics (Prof. Durst) and the Institute of Applied Mathematics (Prof. Gräbner).

• keine Forschungsprojekte eingetragen