A detailed mechanism for heteroepitaxial diamond nucleation under ion bombardment in a microwave plasma enhanced chemical vapour deposition setup on the single crystal surface of iridium is presented. The novel mechanism of Ion Bombardment Induced Buried Lateral Growth (IBI-BLG) is based on the ion bombardment induced formation and lateral spread of epitaxial diamond within a ~1 nm thick carbon layer. Starting from one single primary nucleation event the buried epitaxial island can expand laterally over distances of several microns. During this epitaxial lateral growth typically thousands of isolated secondary nuclei are generated continuously. The unique process is so far only observed on iridium surfaces. It is shown that a diamond single crystal with a diameter of ~90 mm and a weight of 155 carat can be grown from such a carbon film which initially consisted of 2 · 10¹³ individual grains.

中文翻译：

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离子轰击诱导掩埋的横向生长：合成单晶金刚石晶片的关键机制。

提出了在微波等离子体增强化学气相沉积在铱单晶表面上离子轰击下异质外延金刚石成核的详细机理。离子轰击诱导的埋入式横向生长（IBI-BLG）的新机制是基于离子轰击诱导的外延金刚石在约1 nm厚的碳层中的形成和横向扩散。从一个单一的初级成核事件开始，掩埋的外延岛可以横向扩展数微米的距离。在该外延侧向生长期间，通常连续产生数千个分离的次级核。迄今为止，仅在铱表面上观察到了独特的过程。^13个单独的谷物。