Electrical characterization of process-induced defects in 4H-SiC

Abstract

Silicon carbide has become an important material in the implementation of next generation photonics. It harbors the silicon vacancy (VSi) which can be transformed to a carbon antisite-vacancy pair (CSiVC) defect through thermal treatment. This defect has quantum functionality and can be used as a single photon source at room temperature. Using defect engineering, this technology is set to surpass advances made in other similar systems because it is being developed on existing standard industrial practices, fabrication protocols and mechanisms. These include techniques such as irradiation, annealing and ion implantation. The motivation of this work was to establish sound device fabrication protocols to be used in the device implementation. In this thesis DLTS and Laplace DLTS have been used to characterize deep level defects induced by various processes in 4H-SiC. Schottky barrier diodes were used to create the space charge region required to probe the defect characteristics using capacitance DLTS. From the DLTS and Laplace DLTS the activation energies of the defects were accurately deduced and the apparent capture cross section was calculated. The defect concentration was also quanti ed in the form of depth pro les plotted from the metal-semiconductor interface of the Schottky barrier diodes into the bandgap of the semiconductor. SEM, AFM and XRD were used to probe the changes in surface morphology and composition accompanying the processing steps whilst Raman spectroscopy was used to probe the nature of induced defects. Sputter deposition of tungsten on 4H-SiC was successfully used to induce the E0:69 which is the VSi. The identity of VSi was con rmed by thermal treatment and it annealed beyond detection at 600 C as expected. A previously unreported defect, the E0:29 was also observed after sputtering and was attributed to the heavy metal and gas ion residue from the deposition process. In order to transform the VSi into CSiVC, W/4H-SiC diodes were annealed up to 1100 C. This resulted in the formation of defects which were attributed to the interdi usion of silicides and carbides formed at the W/4H-SiC interface, as detected by XRD, migrating into the SiC. This was an unfavourable outcome for photonics applications where purity of the semiconductor is a major concern. As an alternative solution, the VSi was induced in 4H-SiC using 167 MeV, Xe26+ swift heavy ions. Xe is a noble gas therefore it would not react with the semiconductor. The structure and integrity of the lattice structure was conserved after irradiation as deduced from confocal Raman microscopy. The depth and concentration of the defects as observed in confocal Raman was consistent with SRIM simulations. AFM showed that the radiation introduced elongated protrusions on the surface of the semiconductor. The observations show that the silicon vacancy can be induced in 4H-SiC by standard industrial practices such as sputter deposition or ion irradiation.