Atomic layer epitaxy  From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia Jump
to: navigation, search  Atomic layer epitaxy (ALE) or Atomic
Layer Chemical Vapor Deposition (ALCVD), now more generally
called Atomic Layer Deposition (ALD), is a specialized form of
epitaxy that typically deposit alternating monolayers of two
elements onto a substrate. The crystal lattice structure
achieved is thin, uniform, and aligned with the structure of the
substrate. The reactants are brought to the substrate as
alternating pulses with "dead" times in between. ALE makes use
of the fact that the incoming material is bound strongly until
all sites available for chemisorption are occupied. The dead
times are used to flush the excess material. It is mostly used
in semiconductor fabrication to grow thin films of thickness of
the atomic order.   This technique was invented in 1970, then
patented in 1977, by Dr. Tuomo Suntola, at the Helsinki
University of Technology in Finland. Dr. Suntola tried in fact
to grow thin films of Zinc sulfide to fa