Vacancy-Fluorine Clusters in Silicon

A.I. Chroneosa, R.V. Vovkb, I.L. Goulatisb, Z.F. Nazyrovb, V.M. Pinto Simoesc, M. Januszczykd and J.N. Latosińskad aDepartment of Materials, Imperial College, London SW7 2AZ, United Kingdom bKharkov National University, 4 Svoboda Sq., 61077 Kharkov, Ukraine cIPA_Instituto Superior Autónomo de Estudos Politécnicos, Rua de Xabregas, 20, 1° 1900-440 Lisboa, Portugal dAdam Mickiewicz University, Umultowska 85, 61-614 Poznań, Poland

Received: October 21, 2010; in final form: December 7, 2010

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Fluorine (F) doping and the formation of F- vacancy (FnVm) clusters have been extensively studied in silicon (Si) as they can suppress the transient self-interstitial mediated diffusion of boron (B). Recent experimental studies by Bernardi et al. revealed that there is no significant concentration of FnVm clusters (for n ≥ 4, m ≥ 1) in disagreement with a number of density functional theory studies. In the present study we use electronic structure calculations to evaluate the binding energies of FnVm clusters and Vn clusters. The significant binding energies of the V n clusters reveals that the concentration of the large FnVm clusters (n ≥4, m ≥1) will be limited compared to the Vn clusters or even smaller clusters.

DOI: 10.12693/APhysPolA.119.774 PACS numbers: 31.15.es, 61.72.jd, 61.72.uf, 61.72.Yx