We report the growth of dilute GaSbN layers on GaSb substrates by liquid-phase epitaxy using polycrystalline GaN as the source of nitrogen in the growth melt. Atomic force microscopy shows uniform layer surface with root mean square roughness of 2.6 run. Energy dispersive X-ray measurements confirm the presence of nitrogen in the grown layer. The material is further characterized by high-resolution X-ray diffraction and Fourier transform infrared spectroscopy measurements. Nitrogen incorporation up to 1.7% is obtained with a corresponding band gap reduction of 0.37eV. (c) 2006 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.