Metal silicide/poly-Si Schottky diodes for uncooled microbolometers

Nickel silicide Schottky diodes formed on polycrystalline Si films are proposed as temperature sensors of monolithic uncooled microbolometer IR focal plane arrays. Structure and composition of nickel silicide/polycrystalline silicon films synthesized in a low-temperature process are examined by means of transmission electron microscopy. The Ni silicide is identified as multi-phase compound composed by 20 to 40% of Ni3Si, 30 to 60% of Ni2Si and 10 to 30% of NiSi with probable minor content of NiSi2 at the silicide/poly-Si interface. Rectification ratios of the Schottky diodes vary from ~100 to ~20 for the temperature increasing from 22 to 70C; they exceed 1000 at 80K. A barrier of ~0.95 eV is found to control the photovoltage spectra at room temperature. A set of barriers is observed in photo-emf spectra at 80K and attributed to the Ni-silicide/poly-Si interface. Absolute values of temperature coefficients of voltage and current are found to vary from 0.3 to 0.6%/K for forward biasing and around 2.5%/K for reverse biasing of the diodes.Comment: 18 pages, 7 figure

Application of hydrogenation to low-temperature cleaning of the Si(001) surface in the processes of molecular-beam epitaxy: Investigation by STM, RHEED and HRTEM

Structural properties of the clean Si(001) surface obtained as a result of low-temperature (470--650C) pre-growth annealings of silicon wafers in a molecular-beam epitaxy chamber have been investigated. To decrease the cleaning temperature, a silicon surface was hydrogenated in the process of a preliminary chemical treatment in HF and NH_4F aqueous solutions. It has been shown that smooth surfaces composed by wide terraces separated by monoatomic steps can be obtained by dehydrogenation at the temperatures > 600C, whereas clean surfaces obtained at the temperatures < 600C are rough. It has been found that there exists a dependence of structural properties of clean surfaces on the temperature of hydrogen thermal desorption and the process of the preliminary chemical treatment. The frequency of detachment/attachment of Si dimers from/to the steps and effect of the Ehrlich-Schwoebel barrier on ad-dimer migration across steps have been found to be the most probable factors determining a degree of the resultant surface roughness.Comment: 8 pages, 8 figures; version accepted to J. Appl. Phy

The Role of Interdiffusion and Spatial Confinement in the Formation of Resonant Raman Spectra of Ge/Si(100) Heterostructures with Quantum-Dot Arrays

The phonon modes of self-assembled Ge/Si quantum dots grown by molecular-beam epitaxy in an apparatus integrated with a chamber of the scanning tunneling microscope into a single high-vacuum system are investigated using Raman spectroscopy. It is revealed that the Ge-Ge and Si-Ge vibrational modes are considerably enhanced upon excitation of excitons between the valence band $\Lambda_3$ and the conduction band $\Lambda_1$ (the E1 and E1 + $\Delta_1$ transitions). This makes it possible to observe the Raman spectrum of very small amounts of germanium, such as one layer of quantum dots with a germanium layer thickness of 10 \r{A}. The enhancement of these modes suggests a strong electron-phonon interaction of the vibrational modes with the E1 and E1 + $\Delta_1$ excitons in the quantum dot. It is demonstrated that the frequency of the Ge-Ge mode decreases by 10 cm^-1 with a decrease in the thickness of the Ge layer from 10 to 6 \r{A} due to the spatial-confinement effect. The optimum thickness of the Ge layer, for which the size dispersion of quantum dots is minimum, is determined.Comment: 14 pages, 9 figure