Microscopic theory of erbium ion de-excitation processes in silicon

The probability of back transfer increases dramatically with temperature rising. The collision with free carriers is the dominating de-excitation process at low temperature. It was shown that the perturbation of wave function of free carriers by the ionized Coulomb donor center associated with Er ion increases the probability of the Er-ion de-excitation by free electrons dramatically and practically supresses the de-excitation by holes. The Auger de-excitation process, in which the energy from Er ion is consumed by electron going from Er related donor to the conduction band, has been investigated as well.