Growth and shrinkage of stacking faults by gold diffusion in silicon

Abstract

Gold atoms were indiffused at 1150 ‡C into a silicon crystal containing nuclei for point defects, and then annealed at 1000 ‡C. Growth and shrinkage of the stacking faults induced by the gold diffusion has been investigated. In the indiffusion process, the faults grow homogeneously in proportion to the square root of substitutional gold concentration, but the volume density of the faults is limited at the very beginning of the gold diffusion and does not depend on the gold concentration. In the annealing, the faults shrink inhomogeneously and disappear in turn in proportion to the decrease of substitutional gold, keeping the same mean size as before annealing. The difference between behaviours in the growth and shrinkage is caused by the differences during absorption and discharge of silicon atoms by the faults, due to a distortion around the fault edge.