Strain relief via silicon self-interstitial emission in highly boron-doped silicon: A diffuse X-ray scattering study of oxygen precipitation

Abstract

Oxygen precipitation in highly boron-doped Czochralski silicon (5 mΩ cm resistivity) was studied, and a strain-relieving mechanism involving the emission of silicon interstitial atoms (ISi) was identified. Strain-sensitive X-ray diffraction was employed, and through a comparison with complementary electron microscopy measurements a linear misfit strain ϵ=0.01 was determined. Different behavior concerning strain relaxation was measured for wafer-type samples (760 μm thickness) and thick samples (2 mm thickness), which was explained with out-diffusion of ISi in the thinner samples. Based on the experimental findings, a model was developed which invokes an increase in the solubility of interstitial silicon atoms upon boron doping. The model successfully accounts for different effects of boron doping on oxygen precipitation in silicon, which were reported on in literature such as preferential octahedral morphology of precipitates, enhanced nucleation, and relaxed accommodation of the precipitates with respect...