• Journal of the Korean institute of surface engineering
• /
• v.29 no.5
• /
• pp.350-356
• /
• 1996

This paper presents VHF-Plasma Enhanced Chemical Vapor Deposition (VHF-PECVD) of Ti/TiN with silne reduction process, using $TiCl_4$ source. VHF plasma, which is denser than a conventional RF plasma, produces a large number of radicals. Silane reduction process, which supplies silane radicals, more promotes dissociation of Ti-Cl bond than a conventional hydrogen reduction process. therefore, the VHF-PECVD with silane reduction process forms high quality Ti/TiN films, which have low level of Cl content(<0.2 at.%). In result, the resistivity for Ti or TiN is less than 200$\mu$$\Omega$cm. The surface morphology of Ti film is very smooth. The structure of TiN film is amorphous. Furthermore, excellent step coverage for the films is obtained.

• Proceedings of the Korean Institute of Electrical and Electronic Material Engineers Conference
• /
• 2003.07b
• /
• pp.995-998
• /
• 2003

This paper presents the deposition of poly-Si thin-film and fabrication of a solar cell by VHF-PECVD method. The poly-Si thin films. and pin-type solar cells are fabricated using multi-chamber cluster tool system. A 7.4% conversion efficiency was achieved from poly-Si thin film solar cells with total thickness less than $5{\mu}m$. The physical characteristic was measured by Raman spectroscopy, solar cell characteristic was measured under AM1.5 illumination.

• Proceedings of the Korean Vacuum Society Conference
• /
• 2011.02a
• /
• pp.204-205
• /
• 2011

In thin film silicon solar cells, p-i-n structure is adopted instead of p/n junction structure as in wafer-based Si solar cells. PECVD is a most widely used thin film deposition process for a-Si:H or ${\mu}c$-Si:H solar cells. For best performance of thin film silicon solar cell, the dopant profiles at p/i and i/n interfaces need to be as sharp as possible. The sharpness of dopant profiles can easily achieved when using multi-chamber PECVD equipment, in which each layer is deposited in separate chamber. However, in a single-chamber PECVD system, doped and intrinsic layers are deposited in one plasma chamber, which inevitably impedes sharp dopant profiles at the interfaces due to the contamination from previous deposition process. The cross-contamination between layers is a serious drawback of a single-chamber PECVD system in spite of the advantage of lower initial investment cost for the equipment. In order to resolve the cross-contamination problem in single-chamber PECVD systems, flushing method of the chamber with NH3 gas or water vapor after doped layer deposition process has been used. In this study, a new plasma process to solve the cross-contamination problem in a single-chamber PECVD system was suggested. A single-chamber VHF-PECVD system was used for superstrate type p-i-n a-Si:H solar cell manufacturing on Asahi-type U FTO glass. A 80 MHz and 20 watts of pulsed RF power was applied to the parallel plate RF cathode at the frequency of 10 kHz and 80% duty ratio. A mixture gas of Ar, H2 and SiH4 was used for i-layer deposition and the deposition pressure was 0.4 Torr. For p and n layer deposition, B2H6 and PH3 was used as doping gas, respectively. The deposition temperature was $250^{\circ}C$ and the total p-i-n layer thickness was about $3500{\AA}$. In order to remove the deposited B inside of the vacuum chamber during p-layer deposition, a high pulsed RF power of about 80 W was applied right after p-layer deposition without SiH4 gas, which is followed by i-layer and n-layer deposition. Finally, Ag was deposited as top electrode. The best initial solar cell efficiency of 9.5 % for test cell area of 0.2 $cm^2$ could be achieved by applying the in-situ plasma cleaning method. The dependence on RF power and treatment time was investigated along with the SIMS analysis of the p-i interface for boron profiles.

• Journal of the Korean Institute of Electrical and Electronic Material Engineers
• /
• v.33 no.5
• /
• pp.344-349
• /
• 2020

Modern thin film deposition processes require high deposition rates, low costs, and high-quality films. Atmospheric pressure plasma-enhanced chemical vapor deposition (AP-PECVD) meets these requirements. AP-PECVD causes little damage on thin film deposition surfaces compared to conventional PECVD. Moreover, a higher deposition rate is expected due to the surface heating effect of atomic hydrogens in AP-PECVD. In this study, polycrystalline silicon thin film was deposited at a low temperature of 100℃ and then AP-PECVD experiments were performed with various plasma powers and hydrogen gas flow rates. A deposition rate of 15.2 nm/s was obtained at the VHF power of 400 W. In addition, a metal foam showerhead was employed for uniform gas supply, which provided a significant improvement in the thickness uniformity.

• Proceedings of the Korean Vacuum Society Conference
• /
• 2011.08a
• /
• pp.148-148
• /
• 2011

Recently, there have been many research activities to develop the large-area plasma source, which is able to generate the high-density plasma with relatively good uniformity, for the plasma processing in the thin-film solar cell and display panel industries. The large-area CCP sources have been applied to the PECVD process as well as the etching. Especially, the PECVD processes for the depositions of various films such as a-Si:H, ${\mu}c$-Si:H, Si3N4, and SiO2 take a significant portion of processes. In order to achieve higher deposition rate (DR), good uniformity in large-area reactor, and good film quality (low defect density, high film strength, etc.), the application of VHF (>40 MHz) CCP is indispensible. However, the electromagnetic wave effect in the VHF CCP becomes an issue to resolve for the achievement of good uniformity of plasma and film. Here, we propose a new electrode as part of a method to resolve the standing wave effect in the large-area VHF CCP. The electrode is split up a series of strip-type electrodes and the strip-type electrodes and the ground ones are arranged by turns. The standing wave effect in the longitudinal direction of the strip-type electrode is reduced by using the multi-feeding method of VHF power and the uniformity in the transverse direction of the electrodes is achieved by controlling the gas flow and the gap length between the powered electrodes and the substrate. Also, we provide the process results for the growths of the a-Si:H and the ${\mu}c$-Si:H films. The high DR (2.4 nm/s for a-Si:H film and 1.5 nm/s for the ${\mu}c$-Si:H film), the controllable crystallinity (~70%) for the ${\mu}c$-Si:H film, and the relatively good uniformity (1% for a-Si:H film and 7% for the ${\mu}c$-Si:H film) can be obtained at the high frequency of 40 MHz in the large-area discharge (280 mm${\times}$540 mm). Finally, we will discuss the issues in expanding the multi-electrode to the 8G class large-area plasma processing (2.2 m${\times}$2.4 m) and in improving the process efficiency.

• Proceedings of the KIEE Conference
• /
• 2003.07c
• /
• pp.1595-1597
• /
• 2003

This paper presents the deposition of ${\mu}c$-Si:H thin-film and fabrication of a solar cell by VHF-PECVD method. The ${\mu}c$-Si:H thin films and pin-type solar cells are fabricated using multi-chamber cluster tool system. A 7.4% conversion efficiency was achieved from ${\mu}c$-Si:H thin film solar cells with total thickness less than $5{\mu}m$. The physical characteristic was measured by Raman spectroscopy, Solar cell characteristic was measured under AM1.5 illumination.

• Proceedings of the Korean Vacuum Society Conference
• /
• 2010.02a
• /
• pp.152-152
• /
• 2010

이종접합 태양전지에서 Intrinsic a-Si:H의 역할은 상당히 중요하다. Passivation 효과와 높은 Voc에 이르는 핵심적인 Layer이다. 본 연구는 Intrinsic a-Si:H Layer의 증착조건을 가변하여 최적의 Passivation 효과를 얻는데 목적이 있다. 웨이퍼는 n-Type $500\;{\mu}m$두께에를 사용하였다. Intrinsic a-Si:H Layer는 $SiH_4$ 가스와 $H_2$ 가스를 혼합하여 증착하게 되는데 혼합비는 1:5로 고정하였다. 증착두께는 이종접합 태양전지에서 필요한 5nm로 고정하였으며 증착장비는 PECVD를 이용하였다. PECVD는 VHF(60MHz)를 이용하였고 증착온도는 $200^{\circ}C$로 고정하여 진행하였다. 가변내용은 전극거리와 파워, 압력이다. 전극거리는 20mm에서 80mm까지 가변하였고 압력은 100mTorr에서 500mTorr까지 가변하였다. 파워는 플라즈마의 방정특성을 알아본 후 최소파워를 이용하여 증착하였다. 이는 증착 시 플라즈마에 의한 박막 손상을 최소화하기 위함이다. 측정은 QSSPC 방식으로 Carrier Lifetime과 Implied Voc를 측정하였으며 두께는 Ellipsometry를 이용하여 측정하였다. 전극거리 60mm에서 증착압력은 400mTorr이고 파워는 $14mW/cm^2$에서 가장 높은 Carrier Lifetime 과 Implied Voc를 나타내었다. Carrier Lifetime은 2.2ms이고 Implied Voc는 709mV를 달성 하였다. Carrier Lifetime이 높으면 Surface Recombination이 낮다는 의미이며 이는 고효율 이종접합 태양전지 제작에 있어서 직렬저항을 줄일 수 있는 필수적인 요소이다. Implied Voc는 이종접합 태양전지의 Voc에 직결된 인자로 이종접합 태양전지의 Voc를 예상할 수 있는 중요한 요소이다.

• Journal of the Korean Vacuum Society
• /
• v.19 no.5
• /
• pp.331-340
• /
• 2010

3D fluid based numerical modelling is done for a VHF multi hollow cathode array plasma enhanced chemical vapor deposition system. In order to understand the fundamental characteristics of it, Ar plasma is analyzed with a condition of 40 MHz, 100 Vrf and 1 Torr. For hole array of 6 mm diameter and 20 mm inter-hole distance, plasma is well confined within the hole at an electrode gap of 10 mm. The peak plasma density was $5{\times}10^{11}#/cm^3$ at the center of the hole. When the substrate was assumed at ground potential, electron temperature showed a peak at the vicinity of the grounded walls including the substrate and chamber walls. The reaction rate of metastable based two step ionization was 10 times higher than the direct electron impact ionization at this condition. For $H_2$, the spatial localization of discharge is harder to get than Ar due to various pathways of electron impact reactions other than ionization.

• 한국신재생에너지학회:학술대회논문집
• /
• 2005.06a
• /
• pp.192-195
• /
• 2005

The silicon thin film solar cells were fabricated by 13.56 MHz PECVD (Plasma-Enhanced Chemical-Vapor Deposition) and 60 MHz VHF PECVD (Very High-Frequency Plasma-Enhanced Chemical-Vapor Deposition). We focus on textured ZnO:Al films prepared by RF sputtering and post deposition wet chemical etching and studied the surface morphology and optical properties. These films were optimized the light scattering properties of the textured ZnO:Al after wet chemical etching. Finally, the textured ZnO:Al films were successfully applied as substrates for silicon thin films solar cells. The efficiency of tandem solar cells with $0.25 cm^2$ area was $11.8\%$ under $100mW/cm^2$ light intensity. The electrical properties of tandem solar cells were measured with solar simulator (AM 1.5, $100 mW/cm^2)$ and spectral response measurements.

• Proceedings of the Korean Vacuum Society Conference
• /
• 2013.02a
• /
• pp.230-230
• /
• 2013

In amorphous or microcrystalline thin-film silicon solar cells, p-i-n structure is used instead of p/n junction structure as in wafer-based Si solar cells. Hence, these p-i-n structured solar cells inevitably consist of many interfaces and the cell efficiency critically depends on the effective control of these interfaces. In this study, in-situ plasma treatment process of the interfaces was developed to improve the efficiency of a-Si:H solar cell. The p-i-n cell was deposited using a single-chamber VHF-PECVD system, which was driven by a pulsed-RF generator at 80 MHz. In order to solve the cross-contamination problem of p-i layer, high RF power was applied without supplying SiH4 gas after p-layer deposition, which effectively cleaned B contamination inside chamber wall from p-layer deposition. In addition to the p-i interface control, various interface control techniques such as thin layer of TiO2 deposition to prevent H2 plasma reduction of FTO layer, multiple applications of thin i-layer deposition and H2 plasma treatment, H2 plasma treatment of i-layer prior to n-layer deposition, etc. were developed. In order to reduce the reflection at the air-glass interface, anti-reflective SiO2 coating was also adopted. The initial solar cell efficiency over 11% could be achieved for test cell area of 0.2 $cm^2$.