The Effects of Different Fabrication Parameters on the Quality of Polycrystalline Silicon Thin Films Formed by Solid Phase Crystallization (SPC) Technique

Polycrystalline silicon (poly-si) thin films on sinx-coated glass substrates are the promising alternative approach to bulk silicon based solar cells thanks to those of the high electronic qualities and optimized junction structures. in this work, the poly-si films have been fabricated by solid phase crystallization (spc) technique. the films were crystallized in a classical tube furnace at 600oc for 8–26 hours. the structural and optical properties of poly-si thin films on sinx-coated glass substrates were investigated. the degree of crystallinity of films were studied by micro-raman spectroscopy while the orientation and the crystallite size of poly-si thin films were studied using x-ray diffraction (xrd). it is found that crystallization duration has a great effect on the quality of the film. the results of experiments show that the degree of crystallinity increases from 10% to 95% by increasing the annealing duration from 8 hours to 26 hours. the preferential orientation of spc poly-si films crystallized at 600°c is <111> for all annealing times. on the other hand, enhanced annealing duration scales grain size up from 29.6nm to 36.3nm. in addition to these analyses, in this work, the effects of crucible on the crystal quality of spc poly-si films are also investigated. the results show that the material of crucible used in e-beam system should be molybdenum (mo) instead of graphite and has the significant effects on the quality of poly-si films formed by spc technique.