Properties of heavily impurity-doped PbSnTe liquid-phase epitaxial layers grown by the temperature difference method under controlled Te vapor pressure

•Heavily impurity-doped PbxSn1−xTe/PbTe epitaxial layers were grown via TDM-CVP.•Flat surface morphologies of certain PbxSn1−xTe epitaxial layers were attained.•Fermi-level pinning and persistent photoconductivity occurred in In-doped PbSnTe.•Sn was assumed to be a main scattering center in the PbxSn1−xTe epitaxial crystals. We propose the use of heavily impurity-doped Pb1-xSnxTe/PbTe epitaxial layers grown via the temperature difference method under controlled vapor pressure (TDM-CVP) liquid-phase epitaxy (LPE) for the preparation of IV–VI compounds for mid- to far-infrared optical device applications. A flat surface morphology and the distribution of a constant Sn concentration for 0.05≤x≤0.33 were observed in the epitaxial layers using electron-probe microanalysis. The segregation coefficient of Sn in Pb1-xSnxTe grown via TDM-CVP LPE (Tg=640°C) was xSSn／xLSn=0.28. The appearance of the Fermi level pinning and persistent photoconductivity effects in In-doped PbSnTe were also proposed; we estimated that the activation energies of these processes were 2.8 and 39.7meV, respectively, based on the In-doped Pb1-xSnxTe carrier profile as a function of ambient temperature. In Hall mobility measurements, Sn was assumed to be a main scattering center in the Pb1-xSnxTe epitaxial crystals. The impurity effect was also observed in Pb1-xSnxTe epitaxial growth, similar to the effects observed for Tl-doped PbTe bulk crystals. We concluded that the heavily doped Pb1-xSnxTe crystals grown via TDM-CVP LPE can be used to fabricate high-performance mid- to far-infrared optical devices.