Solar furnace annealing of amorphous Si layers

Abstract

We demonstrate that a simple Al solar reflector can be used to induce solid‐phase epitaxy of amorphous Si layers obtained either by ion‐implantation or ion‐deposition techniques. The annealing can be accomplished in air and takes a few seconds for a 1‐cm² sample area. For ion‐implanted samples, the regrown layers are defectfree on 〈100〉 substrates, and contain microtwins on 〈111〉 substrates. For deposited layers on 〈100〉 substrates the degree of epitaxy is not as good as that obtained by furnace annealing (550 followed by 950 °C annealing).