ESR and IR studies on sputtered amorphous Si–C–H, Si–Ge–H and Ge–C–H

Abstract

The change with annealing of the nature of dangling bonds and its relation to hydrogen content have been investigated in hydrogenated binary alloy systems of Si, Ge and C by means of ESR and IR absorption. In a–Si–Ge:H, the density of Ge dangling bonds is found to be larger than that of Si dangling bonds because of preferential attachment of hydrogen to Si. The increase in Ge dangling bonds by annealing is larger than that in Si dangling bonds. In a–Si–C:H and a–Ge–C:H, the density of dangling bonds increases by the detachment of hydrogen at higher temperature than in the case of pure Si and Ge, respectively.