Shaped crystal growth of PbTe by the open tube technique

The possibility of growing shaped A^IVB^VI crystals from the vapour phase by the open tube technique was investigated on PbTe. The thermodynamic conditions to reproducible prepare several habits of PbTe crystals — whiskers, tetrahedral prisms and cubes, platelets (a), dendrites, cubic and octahedral skeletons (b) as well as their properties were examined. The crystalline habits (a) are characterized by perfectly mirror-like (100) surfaces and low dislocation densities. The type and concentration of charge carriers are mainly determined by the vapour composition within the crystallization zone and very from n = 3 × 10¹⁷ to p = 1 × 10¹⁹cm⁻³. These properties are the reason of the interest in shaped PbTe crystals for the aim of IR optoelectronic devices.