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Title:
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Recombination activity of interstitial iron and other transition metal point defects in p- and n-type crystalline silicon
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Author(s):
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Geerligs, L.J.; Macdonald, D.
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Published by:
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Publication date:
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ECN
Solar Energy
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1-11-2004
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ECN report number:
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Document type:
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ECN-RX--04-115
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Article (scientific)
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Number of pages:
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3
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Published in: Applied Physics Letters (American Institute of Physics), , 2004, Vol.85, p.4061-4063.
Abstract:
Interstitial iron in crystalline silicon has a much larger capture cross
section for electrons than holes.
According to the Shockley?Read?Hall model, the low-injection carrier
lifetime in
p-type silicon
should therefore be much lower that in
n-type
silicon, while in high injection they should be equal.
In this work we confirm this modeling using purposely iron-contaminated
samples. A survey of
other transition metal impurities in silicon reveals that those which
tend to occupy interstitial sites
at room temperature also have significantly larger capture cross sections
for electrons. Since these
are also the most probable metal point defects to occur during high
temperature processing, using
n
-type wafers for
devices such as solar cells may offer greater immunity to the effects
of metal
contaminants.
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