Characterization of PECVD Silicon Nitride Passivation with Photoluminescence Imaging

Author

Chen, Florence W. ; Cotter, Jeffrey E. ; Trupke, Thorsten ; Bardos, Robert A.

Author_Institution

Centre for Excellence for Adv. Silicon Photovoltaic & Photonics, New South Wales Univ., Sydney, NSW

Volume

2

fYear

2006

fDate

38838

Firstpage

1372

Lastpage

1375

Abstract

In this paper, we present studies of plasma-enhanced chemical vapor deposited silicon nitride in which photoluminescence imaging was used to characterize our deposition process. A showcase of different processing issues such as equipment design, processing conditions, and manual handling is presented. We also demonstrate how photoluminescence imaging can be particularly useful for process monitoring, diagnoses, and development. An increase in implied V_oc of up to 25 mV was achieved through the use of PL imaging as a diagnostic tool

Keywords

passivation; photoluminescence; plasma CVD; process monitoring; silicon compounds; thin films; PECVD; SiN; diagnostic tool; passivation; photoluminescence imaging; plasma-enhanced chemical vapor deposition; process monitoring; silicon nitride; Chemical processes; Image analysis; Optical films; Passivation; Photoluminescence; Plasma chemistry; Plasma materials processing; Pollution measurement; Semiconductor films; Silicon compounds;

fLanguage

English

Publisher

ieee

Conference_Titel

Photovoltaic Energy Conversion, Conference Record of the 2006 IEEE 4th World Conference on

Conference_Location

Waikoloa, HI

Print_ISBN

1-4244-0017-1

Electronic_ISBN

1-4244-0017-1

Type

conf

DOI

10.1109/WCPEC.2006.279687

Filename

4059901