Thickness-dependent defect structure of epitaxial silicon thin films deposited by hot-wire chemical vapor deposition

Abstract

In this work, we study the defect structure of epitaxial film silicon grown by hot-wire chemical vapor deposition (HWCVD) on Si wafers, as a function of film thickness. We used scanning electron microscopy (SEM) and energydispersive X-ray spectroscopy (EDS) to investigate the distribution, type, and composition of the defects. To investigate the crystallographic structure, we used electron backscattering diffraction (EBSD) on the surface and cross sections of the samples. We observed that, as desired, the films grew epitaxially, and that there was an increase in the density of defects as the film thickness increased.