Temperature dependence of growth rate for diamonds grown using a hot filament assisted chemical vapor deposition method at low substrate temperatures

Abstract

Diamond particles were deposited using a hot filament-assisted chemical vapor deposition (HFCVD) method in which the substrate temperature ranged from 210 to 700°C. The size of the diamond particles measured as a function of time showed that a diamond grows via two periods of incubation and growth. Compared with an activation energy of 10-25 kcal/mol for substrate temperatures higher than 600°C as reported in literature, the growth rate for a diamond grown using a HFCVD method was much less dependent on the substrate temperature for that temperature range investigated in our study. The apparent activation energy, determined from the Arrhenius plot of the substrate temperature versus diamond growth rate, decreased from 5 to 1 kcal/mol with decreasing temperature.