A new process for synthesizing high-purity stoichiometric cadmium telluride

In the frame of a research project aimed at preparing high-resistivity CdTe single crystals, the authors have developed as a first step, a new, low cost, fast technique which allows to synthesize from the elements polycrystalline CdTe with very low stoichiometric deviations and with a level of background impurities much lower than usually available in commercial materials. The material obtained by this technique as will be described and discussed, appears especially suitable for preparing source charges for physical vapour transport growth experiments.