The Manipulation and Alignment of Silicon Carbide Whiskers for Gallium Nitride Epitaxial Growth

As a substrate candidate for low‐cost III ‐nitride thin film growth, 3 C – SiC whiskers are employed and manipulated in this work. The alignment of the whiskers is achieved on a patterned 3M Vikuiti ™ Brightness Enhancement Film surface. The degree of whisker alignment using this approach is higher than the whiskers lined up by extrusion methods according to X ‐ray diffraction ( XRD ) analysis. The aligned whiskers are transferred from the 3M film and embedded into an alumina matrix by tape casting. A self‐regulating sintering technique for SiC whiskers is used to protect the whiskers from being oxidized in air during sintering at 1600°C. The aligned whiskers are rigidly embedded in the alumina matrix as shown in scanning electron microscopy ( SEM ) images and energy‐dispersive X ‐ray spectrometry energy mapping images. GaN thin films grown by a low‐cost sputtering process on Alumina/ SiC as well as Si and SiC as reference materials are characterized by XRD and SEM .