Electrically active defects in p-type silicon after alpha-particle irradiation

In this work, we investigated the defects introduced when boron (B) doped silicon (Si) was irradiated by making use of a 5.4 MeV americium (Am) 241 foil radioactive source with a fluence rate of 7x10(6) cm(-2) s(-1) at room temperature. Deep level transient spectroscopy (DLTS) and Laplace-DLTS measurements were used to investigate the electronic properties of the introduced defects. After exposure at a fluence of 5.1x10(10) cm(-2), the energy levels of the hole traps measured were: H(0.10), H(0.16), H(0.33) and H(0.52) The defect level H(0.10) was tri-vacancy related. H(0.33) was identified as the interstitial carbon (C-i) related defect which was a result of radiation induced damage. H(0.52) was a B-related defect. Explicit deductions about the origin of H(0.16) have not yet been achieved.