Synthesis and Characterization of Ion Beam Assisted Silver Nanosystems in Silicon Based Materials for Enhanced Photocurrent Collection Efficiency

In recent years a great deal of interest has been focused on the synthesis of transitional metal (e.g. Ag, Cu, Fe, Au) nanosystems at the surface to sub-surface regions of Si and SiO2 matrices for fundamental understanding of their structures as well as for development of technological applications with enhanced electronic and optical properties. The applications of the metal nanoparticle or nanocluster (NC) systems range from plasmonics, photovoltaic devices, medical, and biosensors. In all of these applications; the size, shape and distribution of the metallic NCs in the silicon matrix play a key role. Low energy ion implantation followed by thermal annealing (in vacuum or gas environment) is one of the most suitable methods for synthesis of NCs at near surfaces to buried layers below the surfaces of the substrates. This technique can provide control over depth and concentration of the implanted ions in the host matrix. The implanted low energy metal ions initially amorphizes the Si substrates while being distributed at a shallow depth near the substrate surface. When subject to thermal annealing, the implanted ions agglomerate to form clusters of different sizes at different depths depending upon the fluence. However, for the heavier ions implanted with high fluences (~1×1016 - 1×1017 atoms/cm2), there lies challenges for accurately predicting the distribution of the implanted ions due to sputtering of the surface as well as redistribution of the implants within the host matrix. In this dissertation, we report the investigation of the saturation of the concentration of the implanted ion species in the depth profiles with low energies (< 80 keV) metal ions (Ag and Au) in Si (100), while studying the dynamic changes during the ion implantation. Multiple low energies (30-80 keV) Ag ions with different fluences were sequentially implanted into commercially available Si wafers in order to facilitate the formation of Ag NCs with a wide ion distributions range. The light absorption profile according to different sizes of NCs at the near-surface layers in Si were investigated. We have investigated the formation of Ag NCs in the Si matrix as a function of implantation and thermal annealing parameters. The absorbance of light is increased in Ag implanted Si with a significant increase in the current collection in I-V (current-voltage) photo switching measurements. The experimental photovoltaic cells fabricated with the Ag implanted Si samples were optically characterized under AM (air mass) 1.5 solar radiation conditions (~1.0 kW/m2). An enhancement in the charge collection were measured in the annealed samples, where prominent Ag NCs were formed in the Si matrix compared to the as-implanted samples with the amorphous layer. The characterization techniques such as Rutherford Backscattering Spectroscopy, XPS-depth profiling, transmission electron microscopy, optical absorption, and I-V (current-voltage) photo switching measurements were employed to understand the underlying science in the observed properties. The results of these investigations are discussed in this research