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Low temperature deposition, by sputtering, on flexible/plastic substrates offers a relatively cheap alternative for fabricating single-/multilayer thin film devices. However, sputtering yields amorphous material, with low electrical conductivity, and requires subsequent annealing. Demonstrated is a new method of crystallisation, where controlled application of electrical pulses to sputter deposited Si/Si0.8Ge0.2 multilayers is shown to decrease the electrical resistance by as much as 80%.
Inspec keywords: multilayers; elemental semiconductors; crystallisation; electrical conductivity; silicon; silicon compounds; annealing; electrical resistivity; semiconductor thin films
Other keywords:
Subjects: Elemental semiconductors; Low-dimensional structures: growth, structure and nonelectronic properties; Electrical properties of elemental semiconductors (thin films, low-dimensional and nanoscale structures); Solid-solid transitions; Other heat and thermomechanical treatments; Annealing processes in semiconductor technology