Activation energy for the photoluminescence W center in silicon

This work presents a systematic study of the substrate temperature dependence for the formation of the photoluminescent W center during high energy self-ion irradiation of silicon. All previous studies of this center were for postirradiation annealing, and we show that the formation is well described by a thermally activated process involving both the release of point defects from secondary defect complexes and the rate-limited activation of the center itself. We deduce an activation energy of E_a∼0.85 eV for the growth of the W center, and discuss the relationship of this type of experiment to conventional annealing studies.