A study of sputter-induced defects in magnetron-sputtered CoSi2 and TiSi2 Schottky barriers on n- and p-type GaP

Abstract

Magnetron-sputtered CoSi2 and TiSi2 Schottky barriers on n- and p-type GaP were investigated. Their hitherto unknown barrier heights were determined to be 0.98 eV (for CoSi2/n-GaP and CoSi2/p-GaP), 0.91 eV (for TiSi2/n-GaP), and 0.90 eV (for TiSi2/p-GaP). It was found that magnetron-sputtering induced a compensated layer near the surface, both for n- and p-type GaP, with a thickness of about 0.05 μm. As the dependence of the shift of the Mott-Schottky intercept with the V-axis on the substrate dopant concentration obeyed some specific law, we proposed that the defects are neutral complexes of dopant ions and sputter-induced native defects. These native defects were assumed to depend on the Fermi level position, namely the PGa antisite and the VP vacancy for p-GaP and the VGa vacancy for n-GaP. The conversion between these defects occurs by nearest neighbour hopping of a phosphorus atom. The Schottky barrier heights obtained on p-GaP could be explained by Fermi level pinning at the surface due to the PGa defects. This could not be confirmed by n-GaP as the energy level position of the VGa was not available. The defects could be annealed out between 200° C and 300° C and the associated change of the Schottky barrier height corroborated the proposed model.