Use of Electron Channeling Patterns for Process Optimization of Low-Temperature Epitaxial Silicon Using Hot-Wire Chemical Vapor Deposition

We demonstrate the first reported use of electron channeling patterns (ECPs) as a response for a statistical design of experiments process-optimization for epitaxial silicon. In an effort to fully characterize the new hot-wire chemical vapor deposition (HWCVD) method of epitaxial growth recently discovered at NREL, a large number of parameters with widely varying values needed to be considered.To accomplish this, we used the statistical design of experiments method. This technique allows one to limit the number of sample points necessary to evaluate a given parameter space. In this work we demonstrate how ECPs can effectively be used to optimize the process space as well as to quickly and economically provide the process engineer with absolutely key information.