Veeco Instruments Inc.
Periphery purge shutter and flow control systems and methods

Abstract:

An arrangement of two shutters radially outward from an injector block and a susceptor onto which a wafer carrier is removably mounted are configured to provide a flowpath through a reactor chamber that does not exhibit a vortex, thereby reducing or eliminating buildup on the inside of the reactor chamber and facilitating large temperature gradient between the injector block and the wafer carrier. This can be accomplished by introduction of a purge gas flow at a radially inner wall of an upper shutter, and in some embodiments the purge gas can have a different chemical composition than the precursor gas used to grow desired epitaxial structures on the wafer carrier.