Remote plasma-enhanced chemical vapor deposition (RPCVD) is a low temperature growth technique which has been successfully employed in in-situ remote hydrogen plasma clean of Si(100) surfaces, silicon homoepitaxy and Si1-xGex heteroepitaxy in the temperature range of 150-450 degrees C. The epitaxial process employs an ex-situ wet chemical clean, an in-situ remote hydrogen plasma clean, followed by a remote argon plasma dissociation of silane and germane to generate the precursors for epitaxial growth.