Determination of the thickness distribution of a graphene layer grown on a 2″ SiC wafer by means of Auger electron spectroscopy depth profiling

Auger electron spectroscopy (AES) depth profiling was applied for determination of the thickness of a macroscopic size graphene sheet grown on 2 in. 6H-SiC (0 0 0 1) by sublimation epitaxy. The measured depth profile deviated from the expected exponential form showing the presence of an additional, buffer layer. The measured depth profile was compared to the simulated one which allowed the derivation of the thicknesses of the graphene and buffer layers and the Si concentration of buffer layer. It has been shown that the graphene-like buffer layer contains about 30% unsaturated Si. The depth profiling was carried out in several points (diameter 50 μm), which permitted the constructing of a thickness distribution characterizing the uniformity of the graphene sheet.