The Role of Dark Annealing in Light and Elevated Temperature Induced Degradation in p-Type Mono-Like Silicon

We have studied lifetime instabilities in p-type boron-doped mono-like silicon during light soaking (LS) and dark annealing (DA) at different temperatures, and their behavior upon LS/DA cycling at various degradation and regeneration stages. Despite having similar capture cross section ratios, it is found that the defects responsible for the degradation under illumination and in the dark could stem from two separate reactions, with hydrogen being the common precursor. A model for light and elevated temperature induced degradation (LeTID) is presented based on our experimental findings. It is proposed that hydrogen atoms originally bound in the silicon nitride layer are released into the silicon bulk above a certain firing temperature, which then interact with some other species in the silicon bulk under illumination, causing the LeTID degradation. During the cooling ramp of the firing process or extended DA, hydrogen in the silicon bulk starts to effuse into the ambient, reducing the amount of hydrogen remaining in the silicon bulk, and correspondingly affecting their LeTID behavior. The proposed model provides new insights to help understand complex LeTID behaviors reported in the literature, including its dependence on the firing profile, sample thickness, dopant type, and DA pretreatment.