Cat-doping: Novel method for phosphorus and boron shallow doping in crystalline silicon at 80 °C

TLDR: In this paper, the surface potential of c-Si is controlled by the shallow Cat-doping and the surface recombination velocity of minority carriers is greatly reduced by this potential control.

Abstract: Phosphorus (P) or boron (B) atoms can be doped at temperatures as low as 80 to 350 °C, when crystalline silicon (c-Si) is exposed only for a few minutes to species generated by catalytic cracking reaction of phosphine (PH3) or diborane (B2H6) with heated tungsten (W) catalyzer. This paper is to investigate systematically this novel doping method, “Cat-doping”, in detail. The electrical properties of P or B doped layers are studied by the Van der Pauw method based on the Hall effects measurement. The profiles of P or B atoms in c-Si are observed by secondary ion mass spectrometry mainly from back side of samples to eliminate knock-on effects. It is confirmed that the surface of p-type c-Si is converted to n-type by P Cat-doping at 80 °C, and similarly, that of n-type c-Si is to p-type by B Cat-doping. The doping depth is as shallow as 5 nm or less and the electrically activated doping concentration is 1018 to 1019 cm-3 for both P and B doping. It is also found that the surface potential of c-Si is controlled by the shallow Cat-doping and that the surface recombination velocity of minority carriers in c-Si can be enormously lowered by this potential control.