Raman scattering of light in doped cubic boron nitride

The Raman spectra of single crystals of cubic boron nitride (cBN) doped with beryllium and also synthesized in the absence of dopants are investigated. It is shown that the wide bands at 215 and 535 cm^–1 can be registered in the Raman spectra of the () faces of undoped cBN crystals and that the Be impurity penetrates into the cBN crystals predominantly in the direction of these faces. In the spectra of the investigated cBN samples doped with Be, the contour of the TO and LO phonon lines does not take the Fano shape, in contrast to diamond, which can point to an insufficient concentration of the dopant for attaining the Fano interference or to the absence of it in cBN. The wide bands have been investigated on the assumption that they are boson-like and result from small-size disorders in both undoped and doped cBN samples with the sp³ bond deformed by Be.Translated from Zhurnal Prikladnoi Spektroskopii, Vol. 71, No. 6, pp. 803–809, November–December, 2004.This revised version was published online in April 2005 with a corrected cover date.