The determination of the nucleation region for Si nanoparticles synthesized by pulsed laser ablation was helpful to find proper parameter to obtain the high quality nanocrystalline silicon (nc-Si) thin films. A XeCl excimer laser was used to ablate high-resistively single crystalline Si target under a deposition pressure of 10 Pa. Glass or single crystalline (111) Si substrates, in parallel with the axial direction of silicon target, were located at a distance of 2.0 cm under the plasma to collect a series of nc-Si thin films. The Raman spectra, X-ray diffraction spectra (XRD) and Scanning electron microscopy (SEM) images show that Si nanoparticles deposited in substrates were only formed in the range 0.3~3.0cm away from the target. In this area, the size of the nanoparticles increased firstly and then reduced, meanwhile, the distributions for the size of the nanoparticles were also changed. According to the character of the beginning and the terminus of "nucleation area", combining with the "Horizontal Projectile Motion", the range and position of "nucleation area" were determination.

Date Published: 6 October 2010
PDF: 5 pages
Proc. SPIE 7655, 5th International Symposium on Advanced Optical Manufacturing and Testing Technologies: Advanced Optical Manufacturing Technologies, 76553C (6 October 2010); doi: 10.1117/12.867055

Published in SPIE Proceedings Vol. 7655:
5th International Symposium on Advanced Optical Manufacturing and Testing Technologies: Advanced Optical Manufacturing Technologies
Li Yang; Yoshiharu Namba; David D. Walker; Shengyi Li, Editor(s)