American Institute of Physics, Applied Physics Letters, 25(101), p. 251906
DOI: 10.1063/1.4772785
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We have investigated the influence of the surface roughness on nitrogen incorporation during the molecular beam epitaxy of diluted nitrides, independently of the other growth parameters. GaPN/GaP layers grown simultaneously on surfaces displaying different roughnesses reveal a large difference in nitrogen incorporation despite the same growth temperature and growth rate. The same difference is found on quasi-lattice-matched GaAsPN demonstrating that the phenomenon is not related to any strain-induced mechanisms. The tendency is clearly confirmed when varying the growth conditions. As a direct consequence, the incorporation of substitutional nitrogen near the atomic step edges is found to be 6.7 times more probable than the in-plane nitrogen incorporation. The formation of N-N{sub i} clusters and their stability on the surface is discussed.