Fabrication of polycrystalline silicon thin films from a-SiOx via the inverted aluminum-induced layer exchange process

•Poly-Si films were first fabricated using a-SiOx via the inverted-ALILE on glass substrates.•The presence of oxygen in the system suppressed the formation Si hillocks in the bottom layer of the annealed structure.•The presence of a-SiOx residual layer in the structure of annealed sample.•The bottom...

Full description

Saved in:
Bibliographic Details
Published in:Materials letters 2020-02, Vol.261, p.127086, Article 127086
Main Authors: Zamchiy, A.O., Baranov, E.A., Maximovskiy, E.A., Volodin, V.A., Vdovin, V.I., Gutakovskii, A.K., Korolkov, I.V.
Format: Article
Language:English
Subjects:
Aluminum
Aluminum-induced crystallization
Amorphous materials
Amorphous silicon
Columnar structure
Crystal structure
Crystallites
Crystallization
Exchanging
Glass substrates
Inclusions
Inverted aluminum-induced layer exchange
Materials science
Phase transformation
Photovoltaic cells
Polycrystalline silicon
Polycrystals
Precipitates
Silicon films
Silicon suboxide
Thin films
Citations: Items that this one cites
Items that cite this one
Online Access:Get full text
Tags: Add Tag
No Tags, Be the first to tag this record!
Description
Summary:•Poly-Si films were first fabricated using a-SiOx via the inverted-ALILE on glass substrates.•The presence of oxygen in the system suppressed the formation Si hillocks in the bottom layer of the annealed structure.•The presence of a-SiOx residual layer in the structure of annealed sample.•The bottom layer consists of Al, Si, and O atoms mixture with Si nanocrystallites inclusions.•The poly-Si formed had a preferred (1 1 1) crystal orientation and an average crystallite size of 4.5 µm. A novel fabrication method of polycrystalline silicon (poly-Si) films by aluminum-induced crystallization of amorphous silicon suboxide (a-SiO0.2) material via the inverted aluminum-induced layer exchange (ALILE) mechanism on glass substrates is presented. The presence of oxygen in the system prevented the formation of columnar crystalline Si precipitates (hillocks) in the bottom layer of the structure even at a process temperature of 550 °C. At the same time, this layer, consisting of Al, Si, and O atoms, contained nanocrystalline Si inclusions and a layer of initial a-SiOx with a thickness of about 60 nm, which was called the “a-SiOx residual layer”. The poly-Si formed had a preferred (1 1 1) crystal orientation and an average crystallite size of 4.5 µm.
ISSN:0167-577X
1873-4979
DOI:10.1016/j.matlet.2019.127086