LS Experimentalphysik / Materialwissenschaften
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Nanotopography development induced by photoelectrochemical in situ conditioning of silicon is followed using a combination of surface sensitive analysis techniques. In an etching study, vertical nanostructure analysis reveals a buried stressed layer within silicon, identified by Brewster-angle analysis (BAA). In conjunction with in system synchrotron radiation photoelectron spectroscopy (SRPES), a superior quality hydrogen terminated Si(111) surface could be prepared by obliteration of the intermediate stressed layer. Using a novel photoelectrochemical structure formation method, a variety of vertical nanotopographies has been generated and analyzed by in situ Brewster-angle reflectometry (BAR) and scanning probe microscopy (SPM). Shaping of the nanostructures became possible by real-time monitoring using BAR. Appearances range from aligned single nanoislands with improved aspect ratio to connected Si nano-networks. A model was developed to describe the nanostructure formation based on stress-induced selective oxidation. Increased local photo-oxidation is found to result in the formation of extended horizontal micro- and nanostructures with fractal properties. Within a defined light intensity range, the structures reveal the azimuthal symmetry of the investigated crystal planes (111), (100), (110) and (113). The observed features could be reproduced using a model that is based on the interplay of stress in silicon, oxidation by light generated excess holes and locally increased etching in fluoride containing solution.
The International Linear Collider offers a lot of different interesting challenges concerning the physics of elementary particles as well as the development of accelerator and detector technologies. In this thesis, we investigate two rather separate topics - the precision measurement of the Higgs boson mass and of its coupling to the neutral gauge boson Z and the research and development of sensors for BeamCal, which is a sub-detector system of the ILC detector. After the Higgs boson has been found, it is important to determine its properties with high precision. We employ the Higgs-strahlung process for this purpose. A virtual Z boson is created in the electron-positron collisions, which emits a Higgs-boson while becoming on-shell. Using the so-called recoil technique, we determine the Higgs boson mass by reconstructing the Z boson momentum and using the center-of-mass energy of the colliding leptons. This technique allows to measure the Higgs boson mass without considering the Higgs boson decay, i.e. it can be applied even to a Higgs boson invisibly decaying. Monte-Carlo studies including a full detector simulation and a full event reconstruction were performed to simulate the impact of a realistic detector model on the precision of the Higgs boson mass and production cross-section measurement. Also, an analytical estimate of the influence of a given detector performance on the Higgs boson mass measurement uncertainty is given. We included a complete sample of background events predicted by the Standard Model, which may have a detector response similar to the signal events. A probabilistic method is used for the signal-background separation. Several other probabilistic methods were used to investigate and improve the measurement of the Higgs-strahlung cross-section and the Higgs boson mass from the recoil mass spectrum obtained after the signal-background separation. For a Higgs boson mass of 120 GeV, a center-of-mass energy of 250 GeV and an integrated luminosity of 50/fb, a relative uncertainty of 10% is obtained for the cross-section measurement, and a precision of 118 MeV for the Higgs boson mass. The original motivation to use the recoil technique for a Higgs boson mass measurement independent on its decay modes could not be completely confirmed. For a Higgs boson mass of 180 GeV and 350 GeV, a statistics corresponding to 50/fb is not sufficient to achieve the necessary significance of the recoil mass peak above the background. The BeamCal is a calorimeter in the very forward region, about 3 m away from the nominal interaction point and surrounding the beam pipe. Due to its location, a lot of beamstrahlung pair particles will hit this calorimeter, representing a challenge for the operational reliability of the sensors under such harsh radiation conditions. We investigated single-crystal and polycrystalline CVD diamond, gallium arsenide and radiation-hard silicon as sensor candidates for their radiation hardness and found that diamond and gallium arsenide are promising. We used a 10 MeV electron beam of few nA to irradiate the samples under investigation up to doses of 5 MGy for diamond, up to about 1.5 MGy for gallium arsenide and up to about 90 kGy for silicon. We measured in regular periods the CCD to characterize the impact of the absorbed dose on the size of the signal, which is generated by electrons of a Sr-90 source crossing the sensor. Additional measurements such as the dark current and the CCD as functions of the voltage completed the characterization of the sensor candidates. For the single-crystal CVD diamond, also the thermally stimulated current was measured to determine amongst others the defect density created by irradiation. In the diamond samples, evidence for strong polarization effects inside the material was found and investigated in more detail. A phenomenological model based on semi-conductor physics was developed to describe the sensor properties as a function of the applied electric field, the dose and the dose rate. Its predictions were compared with the results of the measurements. Several parameters such as time scales and cross-sections were determined using this model, which led to ongoing investigations.
In this work, the electrical and luminescence properties of a series of Si based materials used for photovoltaics, microelectronics and nanoelectronics have been investigated by means of electron beam induced current (EBIC), cathodoluminescence (CL), photoluminescence (PL) and electroluminescence (EL). Photovoltaic Si produced by block casting has been investigated by EBIC on wafers sliced from different parts of the ingot. The impact of selected solar cell processing steps on the material properties has been evaluated by EBIC utilizing adjacent wafers from the ingot. The temperature dependence of dislocations’ EBIC contrast was measured to assess the degree of dislocation contamination with impurities, yielding low dislocation contamination for the middle of the block and high contamination in the top and bottom regions. This is in agreement with the impurity distribution in the block. It was found that phosphorus diffusion gettering (PDG) followed by SiN firing greatly reduces the recombination activity of extended defects at room temperature, and improves the bulk property simultaneously. The improvement is attributed to both PDG of metal impurities and a passivation effect of SiN firing. In order to better understand the factors limiting the properties of thin polycrystalline Si layers prepared by the Aluminum induced layer exchange (Alile) technique, epilayers grown on (111) and (100) monocrystalline Si substrates were used as a model system to investigate the impact of processing temperature (Ts) and type of substrate. It was found that no dislocations are formed for epilayers on (100) Si, while a high density of dislocations was detected on epilayers prepared on (111) Si at 450 °C. The dislocation density decreases with increasing TS. The diffusion lengths extracted from the energy dependent EBIC collection efficiencies reveal an improvement of the epilayer quality with increasing TS during growth from 450 °C to 650 °C, and a decrease of the epilayer quality at 700 °C. This is attributed to a reduction of the dislocation density with increasing TS and a formation of precipitates during the process. Precipitate formation of at 700 °C is limited because the metal impurities are very mobile at high TS, resulting in a homogeneous distribution of the impurities. Because the impurities are effective lifetime killers of the minority carriers, so the diffusion length decreases. PL measurements on epilayers grown on Si substrates revealed no characteristic dislocation-related luminescence (DRL) lines at room temperature and 77 K, while intense characteristic DRL lines D1 - D4 have been detected in the sample prepared by the Alile technique. This indicates that dislocations in the Alile sample are relatively clean. The possible reason for the purification of the Alile samples is Al induced gettering during the polycrystalline Si layer growth. The diffusion length in the thin top layer of Si-on-insulator (SOI) samples has been successfully measured by EBIC employing suppression of the surface recombination at the buried oxide layer and at surface of the top layer by biasing. The measured diffusion length is several times larger than the layer thickness. Dislocation networks produced by Si wafer direct bonding have been investigated with regard to their electrical properties by EBIC. The networks were observed to show charge carrier collection and electrical conduction. Inhomogeneities in the charge collection were detected in n- and p-type samples under appropriate beam energy. The EBIC contrast behavior can be understood under the consideration of the positively charged oxide precipitates along with dislocations charged with majority carriers, where the appearance of the contrast in dark or bright depends strongly on the ratio of the collection and the recombination loss of the carriers.The luminescence properties of Si nanostructures (Si nanowires, Si nano rods, porous Si, and Si/SiO2 multi quantum wells (MQWs)) are another important subject of this work. Sub-bandgap infrared (IR) luminescence around 1570 nm has been found in Si nanowires, nano rods and porous Si. PL measurements with samples immersed in different liquid media, for example, in aqueous HF (50%), concentrated H2SO4 (98%) and H2O2 established that the sub-bandgap IR luminescence originates from the Si/SiOx interface. Its origin was explained in terms of a simple recombination model through radiative interface states. EL in the sub-bandgap IR range has been observed in simple diodes prepared on porous Si and MQWs at room temperature. The results show the possibility to fabricate an efficient light emitter around 1570 nm wavelength based on the radiative recombination at the Si/Si oxide interface. Based on the knowledge about radiative transitions via the interface states, an improved understanding of luminescence in dislocated samples was proposed.