Patent ID: 8624266

Claim:
A silicon carbide substrate, comprising: a side surface; and a main surface surrounded by said side surface; wherein said silicon carbide substrate has a hexagonal crystal structure; said main surface is inclined by an off angle in an off direction from {0001} plane of said hexagonal crystal; and said main surface has such a characteristic that, among the regions emitting photoluminescent light having a wavelength exceeding 650 nm of said main surface caused by excitation light having higher energy than band-gap of the hexagonal silicon carbide, the number of those having a dimension of at most 15 μm in a direction perpendicular to said off direction and a dimension in a direction parallel to said off direction not larger than a value obtained by dividing penetration length of said excitation light in the hexagonal silicon carbide by a tangent of said off angle is at most 1×10 4 per 1 cm 2 .