Transmission electron microscopy study of Ag/n-Si composites grown on Si (1 1 1) substrates

A transmission electron microscopy (TEM) study was made of 3 μm thick Ag/n-Si composite films deposited on Si (1 1 1) substrates at temperatures of 400 and 550 °C. Containing averages of 22 at.% Ag and 77.9 at.% Si they were prepared by magnetron co-sputtering of Ag and heavily doped n-type Si targets. Films deposited at 400 °C had a large number of Ag particles 5 nm in size embedded in amorphous silicon, while those prepared at 550 °C had many 10 nm sized Ag particles that were embedded in crystalline silicon. Unlike previous studies involving these materials, the Ag particles were uniformly distributed throughout the silicon, with no segregation occurring in the surface areas. This is due to the heavy doping of the silicon matrix and is reported here for the first time.