Amorphous Inclusions in Irradiated Silicon and Their Effects on Material and Device Properties

Abstract

Clustered damage plays an important role in determining the electronic properties of silicon irradiated with particles having a relatively high rate of nonionizing energy loss. This damage has generally been treated as being heavily defected crystal, but substantial evidence points to amorphization. The structure of radiation-produced amorphous regions in silicon is modeled here using atomistic techniques. Those regions consist of a phase distinct from the surrounding crystal, and models based on amorphous inclusions can explain the dominance of clusters in determining key electronic properties in irradiated bulk material and devices.