Electron beam-induced current imaging of chemical vapor-deposited diamond films

Abstract

Electron beam-induced current (EBIC) is applied to the characterization of chemical vapor-deposited (CVD) diamond films. EBIC contrast shows a strong dependence on the orientation of grains relative to the incident electron beam. This is due to the correspondence between certain faces of the diamond grains and enhanced recombination. Cathodoluminescence (CL) images enable identification of the (100) faces of the epitaxial layers as preferential radiative recombination sites, in agreement with the EBIC contrast shown by these films. The capability of the EBIC technique to study recombination processes with high spatial resolution as compared to CL, is analyzed in this work.