Analysis of Iron Precipitation in Silicon as a Basis for Gettering Simulations

Abstract

In order to better understand and model internal gettering of iron in silicon, a quantitative investigation of iron precipitation in silicon containing different oxygen precipitate densities was performed. The number of iron precipitation sites was obtained from the iron precipitation kinetics using Ham's law. At low temperatures, the iron precipitation site density corresponded to the oxygen precipitate density. A strong annealing temperature dependence of the iron precipitate density was observed for the samples with larger oxygen precipitate densities. These data were used to simulate iron precipitation during a slow cool. From those simulations, optimal cooling rates were obtained for different silicon materials assuming various iron precipitation site densities in the denuded zone.