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Experimental evidence of electron capture and emission from trap levels in Cz silicon
Author(s) -
Heinz Friedemann D.,
Niewelt Tim,
Schubert Martin C.
Publication year - 2017
Publication title -
physica status solidi (a)
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 0.532
H-Index - 104
eISSN - 1862-6319
pISSN - 1862-6300
DOI - 10.1002/pssa.201700292
Subject(s) - trap (plumbing) , electron , penning trap , microsecond , atomic physics , conduction band , transient (computer programming) , silicon , photoluminescence , band gap , recombination , free electron model , materials science , molecular physics , physics , condensed matter physics , chemistry , optoelectronics , optics , nuclear physics , meteorology , biochemistry , computer science , gene , operating system
Up to now the existence of trap levels − defect levels in the forbidden band gap which temporary trap minority charge carriers − in Cz silicon was controversially discussed. We directly monitor the transient dynamics of the free electron density in the conduction band by the means of a time correlated single photon counting of photoluminescence. A variation of the experimental conditions reveals both a decrease of the electron density on a timescale of microseconds, which is not governed by recombination and an apparent generation of electrons on a scale of up to multiple seconds. We discuss that the transient dynamics may be excellently described by trap levels, providing strong evidence for their existence.