Studies of Indium-Doped Silicon

Abstract : Areas of current interest in infrared detector development include the development of larger arrays, the use of cheaper materials, and the integration of the detectors and processing electronics onto the same chip. Silicon doped with various impurities can be used as a photodetector in many regions of the infrared. silicon is available in large areas and the technology and equipment needed to process the detectors and coupled electronics is that used in the current silicon electronics industry. Because of this the production of chips with integrated detectors and electronics would be cheaper with silicon than with any other material. The yields, uniformity, and quality of silicon devices might be expected to be better for silicon than for any other less highly developed material and the development time and cost should be much less. The specific aims of this study effort were three fold: (1) Develop a new growth process which can produce better-quality indium-doped silicon than current Czochralski or float-zone techniques; (2) Determine the origin of the X-center and if possible eliminate it, and (3) Determine the trapping parameters of centers in indium-doped silicon.