Fast deposition of microcrystalline silicon with an expanding thermal plasma

Large area uniformity of plasma grown hydrogenated nanocrystalline silicon and its application in TFTs

“…This explanation is consistent with the refractive indices of Fig. 5(b), which are lower than that of both c-Si and a-Si:H. The refractive index might be reduced due to the possible voids in the structure [23,26]. Besides, existence of the voids and correlation of C O with n imply that oxygen diffuses into the films after breaking the vacuum.…”

The role of the silyl radical in plasma deposition of microcrystalline silicon

“…In this paper, c-Si: H films have been prepared using expanding thermal plasma (ETP) CVD. 18 ETP CVD is a remote plasma deposition technique, in which the plasma generation takes place in a relatively high pressure chamber (the cascaded arc plasma source), separate from the plasma chemistry that takes place when the precursor is injected in the low-pressure process chamber. This simplifies the chemistry to such an extent that ETP CVD is a suitable plasma deposition technique for the investigation of the influence of the plasma chemistry on the film deposition.…”

“…As a consequence of the high atomic hydrogen density in the reaction chamber, the depletion of SiH 4 is very high and can even reach 100%. 18 Furthermore, subsequent hydrogen abstraction reactions will take place, creating SiH x with x Ͻ 3. This is clearly illustrated by the CRDS measurements by Hamers et al, in which the SiH 4 flow is varied for a constant Ar and H 2 flow.…”

Remote plasma deposition of microcrystalline silicon thin-films: Film structure and the role of atomic hydrogen

“…Previous work, however, has shown that the μc-Si:H material quality is poor [12][13][14][15]. In general, device-grade microcrystalline (and amorphous) silicon material is found close to the so-called amorphous-tomicrocrystalline transition regime, i.e.…”