Structural properties of polycrystalline silicon seed layers made on glass by solid-phase crystallisation

We made high-quality n/sup +/-doped polycrystalline silicon (poly-Si) thin-films on glass for a prospective use as seed layers for subsequent epitaxial growth of poly-Si thin-film solar cells. The seed layers are less than 200 nm thick, have a grain size of up to 2 /spl mu/m, and were made from PECVD-deposited phosphorus-doped a-Si precursor layers that were thermally crystallised ("solid-phase crystallisation", SPC) at about 600/spl deg/C using various temperature-time profiles. In this paper we present the structural properties of these SPC poly-Si films on glass, as determined by transmission electron microscopy and focussed ion beam investigations.