Evidence for the role of hydrogen in the stabilization of minority carrier lifetime in boron-doped Czochralski silicon
- School of Photovoltaic and Renewable Energy Engineering, University of New South Wales, 2031 Sydney (Australia)
This study demonstrates that the presence of a hydrogen source during fast-firing is critical to the regeneration of B-O defects and that is it not a pure thermally based mechanism or due to plasma exposure. Boron-doped p-type wafers were fired with and without hydrogen-rich silicon nitride (SiN{sub x}:H) films present during the fast-firing process. After an initial light-induced degradation step, only wafers fired with the SiN{sub x}:H films present were found to undergo permanent and complete recovery of lifetime during subsequent illuminated annealing. In comparison, wafers fired bare, i.e., without SiN{sub x}:H films present during firing, were found to demonstrate no permanent recovery in lifetime. Further, prior exposure to hydrogen-rich plasma processing was found to have no impact on permanent lifetime recovery in bare-fired wafers. This lends weight to a hydrogen-based model for B-O defect passivation and casts doubt on the role of non-hydrogen species in the permanent passivation of B-O defects in commercial-grade p-type Czochralski silicon wafers.
- OSTI ID:
- 22398977
- Journal Information:
- Applied Physics Letters, Vol. 106, Issue 17; Other Information: (c) 2015 AIP Publishing LLC; Country of input: International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA); ISSN 0003-6951
- Country of Publication:
- United States
- Language:
- English
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