Deposition of boron doped a-Si:H films by a novel combination of RF glow discharge technique and filament heating: Enhancement of doping efficiency

Debabrata Das*, S. N. Sharma, T. K. Bhattacharyya, S. Chattopadhyay, A. K. Barua, Ratnabali Banerjee

*Corresponding author for this work

Research output: Contribution to journalArticlepeer-review

3 Scopus citations

Abstract

A novel variation of plasma enhanced chemical vapour deposition in the form of insertion of a heated filament in the plasma was applied to a SiH4+1% B2H6 (in H2) +H2 gas mixture for the deposition of boron doped hydrogenated amorphous silicon thin films. Current levels giving filament temperatures below and above the thermionic emission level of the filament material were used to separate the effect of thermal dissociation of B2H6 from that of the production of atomic hydrogen in combination with B2H6 dissociation. Control runs without filament heating but accounting for rise in substrate temperature because of the heated coil were also carried out. The films were characterised by electrical and optical measurements, infrared vibrational spectroscopy and secondary ion mass spectroscopy. A significant enhancement in the doping efficiency, of boron was obtained by this technique and thus was found not to be an artifact of increase in substrate temperature. Nor could it be attributed to the effect of atomic hydrogen only.

Original languageEnglish
Pages (from-to)769-776
Number of pages8
JournalSolid State Communications
Volume97
Issue number9
DOIs
StatePublished - Mar 1996

Keywords

  • A. Semiconductors
  • A. Thin films
  • D. Optical properties

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