High temperature nucleation of oxygen precipitates in Germanium-doped Czochralski silicon

Czochralski silicon (Cz-Si) doped with germanium (Ge) has recently drawn the attentions on the next generation of Cz-Si materials used for ultra large-scale integrated circuits. Oxygen precipitate, which is the most important micro-defect in Ge-doped Cz-Si (GCz-Si), domains the majority properties of bulk silicon. In this presentation, the behaviors of oxygen precipitation in GCz-Si at high temperatures have been studied. It was found that, compared with conventional Cz-Si, the higher-density but smaller-sized oxygen precipitates were formed in GCz-Si at extremely high temperature, which could be ascribed to the enhanced nucleation of oxygen precipitates by the Ge-doping. Meanwhile, compound morphologies of oxygen precipitates consisted of plate-like and polyhedral shapes were found in GCz-Si, which can probably be ascribed to the different levels of vacancy coalesced by the so-called Ge-related complexes in GCz-Si.