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Light-induced structural changes and their correlation to metastable defect creation in intrinsic hydrogenated amorphous silicon films

Journal Article · · Physical Review. B, Condensed Matter and Materials Physics
 [1];  [1];  [1];  [2]
  1. Department of Physics and Astronomy, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, North Carolina 27599-3255 (United States)
  2. National Renewable Energy Laboratory, 1617 Cole Blvd., Golden, Colorado 80401 (United States)
Device-quality intrinsic a-Si:H films were prepared by three methods, hot-wire (HW) chemical vapor deposition (CVD), and glow-discharge (GD) CVD with and without H dilution, and show varied light-induced metastable defect creation [Staebler-Wronski effect (SWE)]. We found the following: (a) In addition to the nonuniform H distribution, the a-Si network is inhomogeneous, and the film prepared by GD is more homogeneous than the HW film. (b) The light-induced increase of Si-H stretching absorption at {approx}2000 cm{sup -1} is on the order of 10{sup -2} in all the films, and an additional decrease at {approx}2025 cm{sup -1} is found in films with larger SWE. (c) The change of the compressive stress is on the order of 10{sup -4} of the initial value in the HW films, which is the same order of magnitude as in GD films. Both the initial stress and light-induced volume expansion decrease with decreasing Si-H concentration. No simple correlation between the light-induced structural changes and the conductivity changes was found in the HW a-Si:H films. We describe the light-induced structural changes in conjunction with the creation of metastable defects by a two-phase model. (c) 2000 The American Physical Society.
OSTI ID:
20217700
Journal Information:
Physical Review. B, Condensed Matter and Materials Physics, Journal Name: Physical Review. B, Condensed Matter and Materials Physics Journal Issue: 11 Vol. 62; ISSN 1098-0121
Country of Publication:
United States
Language:
English