Liquid Phase Epitaxial Growth of Silicon on Porous Silicon for Photovoltaic Applications

✍ Scribed by S. Berger; S. Quoizola; A. Fave; A. Ouldabbes; A. Kaminski; S. Perichon; N-E. Chabane-Sari; D. Barbier; A. Laugier

• Publisher: John Wiley and Sons
• Year: 2001
• Tongue: English
• Weight: 198 KB
• Volume: 36
• Category: Article
• ISSN: 0232-1300
• DOI: 10.1002/1521-4079(200110)36:8/10<1005::aid-crat1005>3.0.co;2-s

✦ Synopsis

The aim of this experiment is to grow a thin silicon layer (<50µm) by Liquid Phase Epitaxy (LPE) onto porous silicon. This one acts as a sacrificial layer in order to transfer the 50 µm epitaxial layer onto foreign substrates like ceramics. After transfer, the silicon wafer is then re-usable. In this work, we used the following procedure : the porous silicon formation by HF anodisation on (100) or (111) Si wafers is realised in first step, followed by an eventual annealing in H 2 atmosphere, and finally LPE silicon growth with different temperature profiles in order to obtain a silicon layer on the sacrificial porous silicon (p-Si). We observed a pyramidal growth on the surface of the (100) porous silicon but the coalescence was difficult to obtain. However, on a p-Si (111) oriented wafer, homogeneous layers were obtained.