Effect of washing on identification of Bacillus spores by principal-component analysis of fluorescence data

The fluorescence spectra of Bacillus spores are measured at excitation wavelengths of 280, 310, 340, 370, and 400 nm. When cluster analysis is used with the principal-component analysis, the Bacillus globigii spores can be distinguished from the other species of Bacillus spores (B. cereus, B. popilliae, and B. thuringiensis). To test how robust the identification process is with the fluorescence spectra, the B. globigii is obtained from three separate preparations in different laboratories. Furthermore the fluorescence is measured before and after washing and redrying the B. globigii spores. Using the cluster analysis of the first two or three principal components of the fluorescence spectra, one is able to distinguish B. globigii spores from the other species, independent of preparing or washing the spores.     

Temperature dependence of the optical properties of Hg1−xCdxTe

The alloy composition of Hg_1−xCd_xTe should be controlled during growth, so that the desired band gap and the lattice-matched layer may be obtained. In-situ spectroscopic ellipsometry, now commercially available, enables one to acquire spectral data during growth. If one knows the optical dielectric function as a function of alloy composition and temperature, the technique can be fully used to monitor and control temperature, the thickness, and the alloy composition. For this purpose, we first obtained temperature dependent spectral data of Hg_1−xCd_xTe by spectroscopic ellipsometry (SE). The spectral data of Hg_1−xCd_xTe with x = 1,0.235, and 0.344 were obtained from room temperature to 800Kin the photon energy range from 1.3 to 6 eV. The spectral data revealed distinctive critical point structures at E₀, E₀+Δ₀, E₁, E₁+Δ₁, E₂(X), and E₂(Σ). Critical point energies decreased and linewidths increased monotonically as temperature increased. The model for the optical dielectric function enabled (i) the critical point parameters to be determined accurately, and (ii) the spectral data to be expressed as a function of temperature within and outside the experimental range.     

Comparative Study of HgCdTe Etchants: An Electrical Characterization

A comparative study of wet etchants for both molecular beam epitaxy (MBE) and liquid phase epitaxy (LPE) grown n- and p-type samples was performed using capacitance–voltage (C–V) characteristics and surface recombination velocity (SRV) extracted from photoconductive decay (PCD) measurements. Different wet etchants were divided in two categories, (i) where bromine is a direct reagent in the etching solution and (ii) where bromine is a byproduct after reaction among different reagents. Negative shift of the flat-band voltages were observed for both n- and p-type samples treated with second category of etchants. A decrease in minority carrier lifetimes and an increase in the surface recombination velocities were also observed for the n-type samples treated with second category of etchants.     

Improvement of the accuracy of the In-situ ellipsometric measurements of temperature and alloy composition for MBE grown HgCdTe LWIR/MWIR structures

Spectroscopic ellipsometry (SE) has proven to be a very reliable technique for the in-situ monitoring of the substrate temperature and alloy composition during the HgCdTe epitaxy. In this work, the influence of the variations in the angle of incidence and the spectral wavelength shift on the measured accuracy of the growth temperature and alloy composition are studied, and a method for precisely determining these variations independent of the modeling of the SE data has been developed. It is shown that the stability of the fittings of the optical models for in-situ applications increases and that the couplings between model parameter decreases upon either eliminating the angle of incidence as an independent model parameter or correcting for the shifts of the wavelength offset. The variations in the angle of incidence and wavelength shift, which arise in the M88 ellipsometer from reflected beam deflections, were precisely calibrated in two dimensions as a function of alignment parameters, using a thick thermally grown SiO₂/Si sample and were parameterized for our experimental geometry. A new extension of theWVASE software was developed to correct the raw SE data in real time for wavelength shift and the angle of incidence drift. A comparison of the corrected and uncorrected results of in-situ temperature measurements for HgCdTe and CdZnTe(211) B/Si(211) clearly demonstrates that the proposed method significantly enhances the accuracy of temperature and composition readings over a broad range of values in these parameters.     

Investigation of Artificial Forced Cooling in the Bridgman Crystal Growth of Cadmium Zinc Telluride

The effects of artificial forced cooling on the solid–liquid interface and on solute segregation were investigated by modeling the vertical Bridgman method for the single-crystal growth of CdZnTe, taking into consideration effects such as increasing the axial outward heat flux from the crucible bottom, the radial outward heat flux from the crucible wall, and the carbon film thickness on the crucible inner wall. Axial artificially forced cooling noticeably increases convection and the temperature gradient in the melt next to the solid–liquid interface, and substantially reduces interface concavity at the initial solidification stage. Interface concavity increases a little when the solidification proceeds further, however. Axial artificially forced cooling reduces radial solute segregation of the initial segment of the grown crystal and slightly increases the solute iso-concentration segment. Radial artificially forced cooling enhances melt convection substantially, affects solid–liquid interface concavity only slightly, and hardly affects solute segregation in the grown crystal. Doubling the carbon film thickness weakens convection of the melt in front of the interface, substantially increases interface concavity, and hardly affects solute segregation in the grown crystal.