Patent ID: 8088220

Claim:
A method of forming a crystalline structure, the method comprising: providing, at a growth temperature, a liquid (i) consisting essentially of a mixture of AlN and a non-AlN nitride compound, and (ii) having a quality factor greater than approximately 0.14; and forming solid AlN from the liquid, the solid AlN having an oxygen concentration less than 100 parts per million by weight, wherein (i) the quality factor is defined as Q=ΔT(K)/T lm (K), Q being the quality factor, T lm being the lower of the melting points of AlN and the non-AlN nitride compound in degrees Kelvin, and ΔT being the difference between T lm and the minimum liquidus temperature of the pseudo-binary system formed by AlN and the non-AlN nitride compound, and (ii) the growth temperature is lower than a melting point of AlN.