The relaxation behaviour of supersaturated iron in single-crystal silicon at 500 to 750 °C

Murphy, John D.; Falster, R.

doi:10.1063/1.4767378

Cited by 31 publications

(43 citation statements)

References 41 publications

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“…7 presents a comparison of the extracted apparent diffusivities at 250-900 C with the literature values for the Fe diffusivities. 25,34 The fitted apparent diffusivities at 250-700 C are shown to agree in general with the Fe diffusivities reported in the literature, indicating that the gettering process is likely diffusion-limited in this temperature range. Moreover, Sun et al's analysis of the iron decay kinetics at 250-700 C gave an activation energy of 0.76 eV for the iron reduction process, 17 which is close to the iron diffusion activation energy of 0.67 6 0.02 eV reported in Istratov et al 25 and 0.73 6 0.05 eV in Murphy and Falster.…”

Section: Interpretation Of the Measured Iron Decay Kineticssupporting

confidence: 74%

“…This work extends the temperature range to 900 C. A model of iron diffusion to the gettering sites on both wafer surfaces, described in Ref. 34, is used to fit the measured iron decay kinetics at 250-900 C, with the apparent iron diffusivity being a fitting parameter. The kinetics data can be well described by the model, as shown by some examples in Fig.…”

Section: Interpretation Of the Measured Iron Decay Kineticsmentioning

confidence: 99%

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Gettering of interstitial iron in silicon by plasma-enhanced chemical vapour deposited silicon nitride films

Liu

Sun

Markevich

et al. 2016

Journal of Applied Physics

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It is known that the interstitial iron concentration in silicon is reduced after annealing silicon wafers coated with plasma-enhanced chemical vapour deposited (PECVD) silicon nitride films. The underlying mechanism for the significant iron reduction has remained unclear and is investigated in this work. Secondary ion mass spectrometry (SIMS) depth profiling of iron is performed on annealed iron-contaminated single-crystalline silicon wafers passivated with PECVD silicon nitride films. SIMS measurements reveal a high concentration of iron uniformly distributed in the annealed silicon nitride films. This accumulation of iron in the silicon nitride film matches the interstitial iron loss in the silicon bulk. This finding conclusively shows that the interstitial iron is gettered by the silicon nitride films during annealing over a wide temperature range from 250 °C to 900 °C, via a segregation gettering effect. Further experimental evidence is presented to support this finding. Deep-level transient spectroscopy analysis shows that no new electrically active defects are formed in the silicon bulk after annealing iron-containing silicon with silicon nitride films, confirming that the interstitial iron loss is not due to a change in the chemical structure of iron related defects in the silicon bulk. In addition, once the annealed silicon nitride films are removed, subsequent high temperature processes do not result in any reappearance of iron. Finally, the experimentally measured iron decay kinetics are shown to agree with a model of iron diffusion to the surface gettering sites, indicating a diffusion-limited iron gettering process for temperatures below 700 °C. The gettering process is found to become reaction-limited at higher temperatures.

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Section: Interpretation Of the Measured Iron Decay Kineticssupporting

confidence: 74%

Section: Interpretation Of the Measured Iron Decay Kineticsmentioning

confidence: 99%

Gettering of interstitial iron in silicon by plasma-enhanced chemical vapour deposited silicon nitride films

Liu

Sun

Markevich

et al. 2016

Journal of Applied Physics

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“…However, in general our results do not show the systematic decay in bulk iron concentration with annealing time and temperature observed by Krain et al [12]. This is surprising because at the temperatures used the interstitial iron is massively supersaturated [18,19], which provides a driving force for precipitation. The reason for the discrepancy with Krain et al's work is not clearly understood, and this study aims to start to address this.…”

Section: Introductioncontrasting

confidence: 48%

“…At all temperatures studied, the measured interstitial iron concentrations are substantially in excess of the solubility values [18,19]. It is therefore surprising that the measured values increase upon annealing.…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 87%

Hydrogénation effect on low temperature internal gettering in multicrystalline silicon

Al‐Amin

Murphy

2016

2016 IEEE 43rd Photovoltaic Specialists Conference (PVSC)

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“…Additionally, most of the solar cell processes that we simulate occur at higher temperatures where this solubility enhancement becomes negligible. The solubility and concentration gradient diffusion equations are solved by the algorithm suggested by Hieslmair et al [42], and the diffusivity of iron, Dp e , is described by Istratov et al [11,43]. Phosphorus diffusion is simulated as described in Bentzen et al [44].…”

Section: Systematic Variation Of Model Elementsmentioning

confidence: 99%

Building intuition of iron evolution during solar cell processing through analysis of different process models

et al. 2015

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An important aspect of Process Simulators for photovoltaics is prediction of defect evolution during device fabrication. Over the last twenty years, these tools have accelerated process optimization, and several Process Simulators for iron, a ubiquitous and deleterious impurity in silicon, have been developed. The diversity of these tools can make it difficult to build intuition about the physics governing iron behavior during processing. Thus, in one unified software environment and using self-consistent terminology, we combine and describe three of these Simulators. We vary structural defect distribution and iron precipitation equations to create eight distinct Models, which we then use to simulate different stages of processing. We find that the structural defect distribution influences the final interstitial iron concentration ([Fe,]) more strongly than the iron precipitation equations. We identify two regimes of iron behavior: (1) diffusivity-limited, in which iron evolution is kinetic ally limited and bulk [Fe,] predictions can vary by an order of magnitude or more, and (2) solubility-limited, in which iron evolution is near thermodynamic equilibrium and the Models yield similar results. This rigorous analysis provides new intuition that can inform Process Simulation, material, and process development, and it enables scientists and engineers to choose an appropriate level of Model complexity based on wafer type and quality, processing conditions, and available computation time.

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The relaxation behaviour of supersaturated iron in single-crystal silicon at 500 to 750 °C

Cited by 31 publications

References 41 publications

Gettering of interstitial iron in silicon by plasma-enhanced chemical vapour deposited silicon nitride films

Gettering of interstitial iron in silicon by plasma-enhanced chemical vapour deposited silicon nitride films

Hydrogénation effect on low temperature internal gettering in multicrystalline silicon

Building intuition of iron evolution during solar cell processing through analysis of different process models

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