Guiding principles for obtaining stabilized amorphous silicon at larger growth rates

Abstract Guiding principles are proposed for preparing stabilized hydrogenated amorphous silicon thin films (a-Si:H) from silane glow-discharge plasmas. Higher order silane related chemical species (HSRS) produced in a silane plasma are suggested as species responsible for modifying the network structure in a resulting film, leading to photo-induced degradation. Formation kinetics of HSRS in the plasma and its contribution ratio to film growth have been studied using rate equations for the successive reactions of SiH2 forming HSRS. As a consequence, excitation frequency to reduce the electron temperature in the plasma and hydrogen dilution ratio to scavenge SiH2 have been indicated as the most important controllable parameters to obtain stabilized a-Si:H at a constant substrate temperature.