Carbon precipitation in silicon: Why is it so difficult?

Taylor, William J.; Tan, T. Y.; Gösele, U.

doi:10.1063/1.109063

Cited by 57 publications

(19 citation statements)

References 15 publications

Supporting

Mentioning

Contrasting

Order By: Relevance

“…Two basic reasons appear to be responsible for this reluctant precipitation. The first reason is the very high interface energy σ C associated with the SiC/Si interface which is much higher than the analogous quantity for oxygen precipitates [36]. Whereas oxygen precipitation is associated with a volume increase of about a factor of two, carbon precipitation, independent of whether a carbon agglomerate or SiC is formed, involves a volume shrinkage of close to one atomic silicon volume for each carbon incorporated in the Cagglomerate or SiC-precipitate (see Fig.…”

Section: Precipitation Behaviormentioning

confidence: 99%

See 1 more Smart Citation

Diffusion Engineering by Carbon in Silicon

et al. 2000

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

The possibility to suppress undesirable diffusion of the base dopant boron in siliconbased bipolar transistor structures by the incorporation of a high concentration of carbon has lead to renewed interest in the behavior of carbon in crystalline silicon. The present paper will review essential features of carbon in silicon including solubility, diffusion mechanisms and precipitation behavior. Based on this information the possibilities to use carbon to influence diffusion of dopants in silicon by the introduction of non-equilibrium concentrations of intrinsic point defects will be discussed as well as the reason for the relatively high resilience against carbon precipitation. Interactions between carbon and oxygen will be mentioned, especially in the context of an as yet unexplained fast out-diffusion of carbon close to the surface.

show abstract

Section: Precipitation Behaviormentioning

confidence: 99%

“…4). As a consequence, a supersaturation of selfinterstitials is supporting carbon precipitation as is well known experimentally, whereas an undersaturation of self-interstitials will make carbon precipitation more difficult [3,36]. Formally, this may be expressed by a critical radius r crit of such a precipitate…”

Section: Precipitation Behaviormentioning

confidence: 99%

Diffusion Engineering by Carbon in Silicon

et al. 2000

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

show abstract

“…The experimental observation that one substitutional carbon can on average trap about 1.2 self-interstitials [75,76] can not be explained by the reaction (8) since it would predict about 0.5 self-interstitials trapped per substitutional carbon atom. Therefore, in reality a high supersaturation of self-interstitials will lead to some kind of carbon agglomeration as is well known from other experiments [69,77]. Initially, this agglomerate can not be the equilibrium phase SiC since this could explain at most a 1:1 ratio of absorbed self-interstitials to substitutional carbon atoms.…”

Section: Cm3mentioning

confidence: 87%

Point Defects, Diffusion and Gettering in Silicon

et al. 1997

Self Cite

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

The status of our knowledge on intrinsic point defects and diffusion mechanisms is reviewed. Special attention is given to the question of the possible role of carbon in influencing effective diffusivities of intrinsic point defects and the resulting consequences for the values of vacancy and self-interstitial thermal equilibrium concentrations and diffusivities. It is pointed out that we might have to deal with the unfortunate situation that the effective diffusivities of intrinsic point defects might be influenced already by a carbon concentration which is below the detection limit and therefore not amenable to measurement and control. Whereas dopant diffusion processes have been modeled and simulated for a long time the first attempts to quantitatively simulate various gettering processes have just started as will be described in the paper. Finally, the subject of microcrack formation in hydrogen implanted silicon will be dealt with as used for the so-called "smart-cut" process for fabricating silicon-on-insulator (SOI) substrates with thin and uniform silicon layers by wafer bonding. Presently no quantitative treatment of this fascinating hydrogen agglomeration phenomenon is available.

show abstract

“…3. 19 Interstitial injection by oxidation provides the easier pathway for strain relaxation below ␤-SiC precipitation threshold. From photoluminescence ͑PL͒ study, 18 it was concluded that postannealing treatment for Si:C alloy results in volume compensation effect by C sub -interstitial complexes formation that leads to blueshift in the broad PL peak, indicating loss of local strain.…”

mentioning

confidence: 99%

Effect of impurities on thermal stability of pseudomorphically strained Si:C layer

Chuang

Wang

Woon

2011

Applied Physics Letters

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

We investigate the thermal stability of pseudomorphically strained Si:C layer using high resolution x-ray diffraction (HRXRD) and Fourier transform infrared (FTIR) spectroscopy. Far below β-SiC precipitation threshold, almost complete strain relaxation is found without significant substitutional carbon (Csub) loss. FTIR shows the strain relaxation is related to volume compensation by Csub-interstitial complex formation through oxidation injection of interstitial. By multilayer HRXRD kinematical simulation, we find correlation of the enhanced strain relaxation to P distribution, implying P’s role as additional interstitial promoter during postannealing treatment. We relate our findings to recent reports on strain relaxation issues in Si:C devices fabrication.

show abstract

Carbon precipitation in silicon: Why is it so difficult?

Cited by 57 publications

References 15 publications

Diffusion Engineering by Carbon in Silicon

Diffusion Engineering by Carbon in Silicon

Point Defects, Diffusion and Gettering in Silicon

Effect of impurities on thermal stability of pseudomorphically strained Si:C layer

Contact Info

Product

Resources

About