Ge-Sb-Te system for rewritable optical data storage by a composition-spread approach

Rainer Cremer; Stepan Kyrsta; Dieter Neuschuetz; Martin Laurenzis; Peter Haring Bolivar; Heinrich Kurz

doi:10.1117/12.424759

23 April 2001 Ge-Sb-Te system for rewritable optical data storage by a composition-spread approach

Rainer Cremer, Stepan Kyrsta, Dieter Neuschuetz, Martin Laurenzis, Peter Haring Bolivar, Heinrich Kurz

Proceedings Volume 4281, Combinatorial and Composition Spread Techniques in Materials and Device Development II; (2001) https://doi.org/10.1117/12.424759
Event: Symposium on Integrated Optics, 2001, San Jose, CA, United States

Abstract

Because of its fast reversible phase change between a crystalline and an amorphous phase and a corresponding change in optical properties, Ge-Sb-Te alloys are well known as materials for phase change optical data storage [1]. Especially the stoichiometric Ge2Sb2Te5 of the GeTe-Sb2Te3 pseudobinary line is suited for this purpose and already commercially used [2]. Nevertheless, the physical principles of this technique are not yet completely understood. In the presented paper a composition-spread approach was used to deposit Ge-Sb-Te films with compositions around the ternary phase Ge2Sb2Te5. The deposition took place in a UHV sputtering chamber using three magnetron cathodes equipped with pure Ge-, Sb- and Te-targets, respectively, for film deposition. Films were deposited on Si-wafers as well as on Si-Al-5i02 stacks. The resulting composition-spread was analyzed by EPMA-mappings and GI-XRD with respect to composition and structure. The velocity of the phase change was determined using a static tester. The correlation between film constitution and kinetics of the phase change revealed that the change from the initialized crystalline phase to the amorphous phase could be achieved in about 20 ns for optimized compositions. Even slight deviations from this composition resulted in a strong decrease of the phase change velocity. Structural analysis proved the existence of two crystalline phases with cubic and hexagonal structure in the initialized films.

Citation Download Citation

Rainer Cremer, Stepan Kyrsta, Dieter Neuschuetz, Martin Laurenzis, Peter Haring Bolivar, and Heinrich Kurz "Ge-Sb-Te system for rewritable optical data storage by a composition-spread approach", Proc. SPIE 4281, Combinatorial and Composition Spread Techniques in Materials and Device Development II, (23 April 2001); https://doi.org/10.1117/12.424759

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