Cubic silicon carbide avalanche photodiodes

Silicon carbide avalanche photodiodes are receiving significant interest for detection of low levels of ultraviolet light. The primary limitation of 3C-SiC is the lack of a large-area, low-defect-density substrate. Nearly all reports of 3C devices have been either grown directly on Si or on wafers that were originally formed on Si. Given that there is a large lattice mismatch between 3C-SiC and Si, the device performance has typically been compromised or dominated by extended defects. There have been previous reports of pn junction 3C-SiC photodiodes operating at low bias grown on Si substrates which had peak wavelengths of 250-350 nm. In this work, we discuss 3C-SiC homojunction avalanche photodiodes grown on hexagonal SiC substrates.