Effect of silicon microstructure on stress-stimulated creation of thermal donors

Abstract

Effect of intentionally created oxygen-related structural defects on generation of thermal donors, TDs in Cz-Si treated at 720K under enhanced hydrostatic pressure of gas ambient, HP, up to 1.5 GPa was investigated. The as-grown Cz-Si samples with initial interstitial oxygen content up to 1.2 X 1018 cm-3 as well as that pre-annealed at 720-1020 K - 105 Pa for up to 170 h, indicate strongly HP - dependent increase of electron concentration in the conduction band after the HT-HP treatment at 720 K for 2-20 h. This confirms the stress-stimulated creation of TDs. HP-induced creation of TDs was much weaker after pre- annealing at 920-1020 K while not detected for the samples containing extended defects. Qualitative explanation of observed phenomena was proposed.