TY - JOUR

T1 - Impact of Hydrogen‐Rich Silicon Nitride Material Properties on Light‐Induced Lifetime Degradation in Multicrystalline Silicon

AU - Bredemeier, Dennis

AU - Walter, Dominic

AU - Heller, Rene

AU - Schmidt, Jan

N1 - Funding Information: The authors thank R. Brendel for the idea to use ion beam characterization techniques for the silicon nitride films, C. Marquardt for sample processing, U. Baumann for helping with the chemical cleaning of the wafers, and B. Wolpensinger as well as M. Halbich for the validation of the measured film thicknesses using scanning electron microscopy. This work was funded by the German State of Lower Saxony and the German Federal Ministry of Economics and Energy within the research project LIMES (Contract no. 0324204D). The content is the responsibility of the authors.

PY - 2019/8/9

Y1 - 2019/8/9

N2 - The root cause of “Light and Elevated Temperature Induced Degradation” (LeTID) of the carrier lifetime in multicrystalline silicon (mc-Si) wafers is investigated by depositing hydrogen-rich silicon nitride (SiN x:H) films of different compositions on boron-doped mc-Si wafers. The extent of LeTID observed in mc-Si after rapid thermal annealing (RTA) shows a positive correlation with the amount of hydrogen introduced from the SiN x:H layers into the bulk. The concentration of in-diffused hydrogen is quantified via measuring the resistivity change due to the formation of boron–hydrogen pairs in boron-doped float-zone silicon wafers processed in parallel to the mc-Si wafers. The measurements clearly show that the in-diffusion of hydrogen into the silicon bulk during RTA depends on both the atomic density of the SiN x:H film as well as the film thickness. Importantly, the impact of SiN x:H film properties on LeTID shows the same qualitative dependence as the hydrogen content in the silicon bulk, providing evidence that hydrogen is involved in the LeTID defect activation process.

AB - The root cause of “Light and Elevated Temperature Induced Degradation” (LeTID) of the carrier lifetime in multicrystalline silicon (mc-Si) wafers is investigated by depositing hydrogen-rich silicon nitride (SiN x:H) films of different compositions on boron-doped mc-Si wafers. The extent of LeTID observed in mc-Si after rapid thermal annealing (RTA) shows a positive correlation with the amount of hydrogen introduced from the SiN x:H layers into the bulk. The concentration of in-diffused hydrogen is quantified via measuring the resistivity change due to the formation of boron–hydrogen pairs in boron-doped float-zone silicon wafers processed in parallel to the mc-Si wafers. The measurements clearly show that the in-diffusion of hydrogen into the silicon bulk during RTA depends on both the atomic density of the SiN x:H film as well as the film thickness. Importantly, the impact of SiN x:H film properties on LeTID shows the same qualitative dependence as the hydrogen content in the silicon bulk, providing evidence that hydrogen is involved in the LeTID defect activation process.

KW - LeTID defects

KW - carrier lifetime

KW - hydrogen

KW - light-induced lifetime degradation

KW - silicon nitride

KW - ulticrystalline silicon

UR - http://www.scopus.com/inward/record.url?scp=85065030698&partnerID=8YFLogxK

U2 - 10.1002/pssr.201900201

DO - 10.1002/pssr.201900201

M3 - Letter

VL - 13

JO - Physica Status Solidi - Rapid Research Letters

JF - Physica Status Solidi - Rapid Research Letters

SN - 1862-6254

IS - 8

M1 - 1900201

ER -