"

Cookies ussage consent

Our site saves small pieces of text information (cookies) on your device in order to deliver better content and for statistical purposes. You can disable the usage of cookies by changing the settings of your browser. By browsing our site without changing the browser settings you grant us permission to store that information on your device.

I agree, do not show this message again.

ELECTRONIC PROPERTIES OF HYDROGENATED AMORPHOUS SILICON PREPARED IN EXPANDING THERMAL PLASMAS

M. Brinza1,* , G. J. Adriaenssens1

Affiliation

  1. Laboratorium voor Halfgeleiderfysica, University of Leuven, Celestijnenlaan 200D, B-3001 Leuven, Belgium

Abstract

The expanding thermal plasma (ETP) technique allows the deposition of hydrogenated amorphous silicon (a-Si:H) layers at rates up to 10 nm/s. Schottky barrier cells from Eindhoven University of Technology and p-i-n structures from Delft University of Technology have been examined with the time-of-flight transient photoconductivity technique to determine the carrier mobilities, tail state distributions and gap state densities of the material in function of the deposition parameters. To obtain electronic-quality material at high deposition rates, it is necessary to use substrate temperatures as high as 450 °C. As a function of the chosen deposition parameters, ETP a-Si:H does reveal a wide spectrum of electronic properties, ranging from characteristics close to those of a-Si:H made by standard plasma-enhanced chemical vapour deposition, to evidence for nanoscopic ordered inclusions of the type found in so-called polymorphous silicon layers. One hallmark property of the best ETP a-Si:H is a remarkably high hole drift mobility of ∼10−2 cm2 V−1s−1. Gap state densities of 1016 cm−3 eV−1 and above have been measured..

Keywords

Hydrogenated amorphous silicon, Plasma deposition, Drift mobility, Time-of-flight photocurrents, Nanostructure.

Submitted at: Dec. 9, 2004
Accepted at: Jan. 26, 2005

Citation

M. Brinza, G. J. Adriaenssens, ELECTRONIC PROPERTIES OF HYDROGENATED AMORPHOUS SILICON PREPARED IN EXPANDING THERMAL PLASMAS, Journal of Optoelectronics and Advanced Materials Vol. 7, Iss. 1, pp. 73-81 (2005)