Hg incorporation in CdTe during the growth of HgTe-CdTe superlattices by molecular beam epitaxy

HgTe‐CdTe superlattices and other microstructures such as single and double barrier tunneling structures are commonly grown by molecular beam epitaxy with the mercury flux continuously on the sample during the growth. This means that some mercury will be incorporated in the CdTe layers. We present here, for the first time, a measurement of the amount of mercury incorporated in thin layers of CdTe. X‐ray photoelectron spectroscopy was used to measure the amount of mercury. The amount of mercury was found to be between 3 and 9% for CdTe (111)B, depending on the growth conditions. The amount of mercury was found to increase with mercury flux and to decrease as the substrate temperature was increased. Under the same conditions, it was found that much more mercury was incorporated in the (100) orientation. The type of substrate (CdTe or GaAs) was not found to influence the results. These results indicate that the amount of mercury in the CdTe layers of HgTe‐CdTe superlattices is not quite as low as expected from measurements of thick CdTe layers, but it can be low enough that it does not influence significantly the results on the superlattice system in the (111) orientation.