BGaAs and BInGaAs alloys have been grown by metalorganic vapour phase epitaxy. The epitaxial layers were grown on (001) GaAs substrates misoriented 1 degrees towards [110] using diborane, trimethylindium, triethylgallium and arsine as precursors. The influence of diborane flow rate on the growth mode of BGaAs layers was highlighted. We also studied the influence of boron gas-phase concentration and growth temperature on the incorporation of boron and indium into BGaAs and BInGaAs alloys. BInGaAs/GaAs single quantum wells were grown and quantum well emission was observed by photoluminescence at room and low temperature. At 300 K, emission wavelength was up to 1.07 mu m. (c) 2006 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.