Shin-etsu Chemical Co., Ltd.

Shin-etsu Chemical C O., Ltd.

Koichi Tanaka

Shoji Akiyama

Makoto Kawai

Atsuo Ito

Yuuji Tobisaka

Yoshihiro Kubota

Masahiro Furuya

Yoshihiro Kuboto

Ito Atsuo

There is disclosed a method for manufacturing an SOI wafer comprising: a step of implanting at least one of a hydrogen ion and a rare gas ion into a donor wafer to form an ion implanted layer; a step of bonding an ion implanted surface of the donor wafer to a handle wafer; a step of delaminating the donor wafer at the ion implanted layer to reduce a film thickness of the donor wafer, thereby providing an SOI layer; and a step of etching the SOI layer to reduce a thickness of the SOI layer, wherein the etching step includes: a stage of performing rough etching as wet etching; a stage of measuring a film thickness distribution of the SOI layer after the rough etching; and a stage of performing precise etching as dry etching based on the measured film thickness distribution of the SOI layer. There can be provided A method for manufacturing an SOI wafer having high film thickness uniformity of an SOI layer with excellent productivity.

Method for reducing the thickness of an SOI layer

A method of manufacturing a laminated substrate is provided. The method includes: forming an oxide film on at least a surface of a first substrate having a hardness of equal to or more than 150 GPa in Young's modulus, and then smoothing the oxide film; implanting hydrogen ions or rare gas ions, or mixed gas ions thereof from a surface of a second substrate to form an ion-implanted layer inside the substrate, laminating the first substrate and the second substrate through at least the oxide film, and then detaching the second substrate in the ion-implanted layer to form a laminated substrate; heat-treating the laminated substrate and diffusing outwardly the oxide film.

Process for producing laminated substrate and laminated substrate

There is disclosed a method for manufacturing an SOI wafer comprising at least: implanting a hydrogen ion, a rare gas ion, or both the ions into a donor wafer formed of a silicon wafer or a silicon wafer having an oxide film formed on a surface thereof from a surface of the donor wafer, thereby forming an ion implanted layer; performing a plasma activation treatment with respect to at least one of an ion implanted surface of the donor wafer and a surface of a handle wafer, the surface of the handle wafer is to be bonded to the ion implanted surface; closely bonding these surfaces to each other; mechanically delaminating the donor wafer at the ion implanted layer as a boundary and thereby reducing a film thickness thereof to provide an SOI layer, and performing a heat treatment at 600 to 1000&#xb0; C.; and polishing a surface of the SOI layer for 10 to 50 nm based on chemical mechanical polishing. A method for manufacturing with excellent productivity an SOI wafer having an SOI layer with a mirror-finished surface and high film thickness uniformity can be provided.

Method for manufacturing SOI wafer

Hydrogen ions are implanted to a surface (main surface) of the single crystal Si substrateat a dosage of 1.5&#xd7;10atoms/cmor higher to form the hydrogen ion implanted layer (ion-implanted damage layer). As a result of the hydrogen ion implantation, the hydrogen ion implanted boundaryis formed. The single crystal Si substrateand the low melting glass substrateare bonded together. The bonded substrate is heated at relatively low temperature, 120&#xb0; C. or higher and 250&#xb0; C. or lower (below a melting point of the support substrate). Further, an external shock is applied to delaminate the Si crystal film along the hydrogen ion implanted boundaryof the single crystal Si substrateout of the heat-treated bonded substrate. Then, the surface of the resultant silicon thin filmis polished to remove a damaged portion, so that a semiconductor substrate can be fabricated. There can be provided a semiconductor substrate in which a high-quality silicon thin film is transferred onto a substrate made of a low melting point material.

Method for manufacturing semiconductor substrate

A method for producing a single crystal silicon solar cell including the steps of: implanting ions into a single crystal silicon substrate; conducting a surface activating treatment for at least one of: the ion implanting surface of the single crystal silicon substrate, and a surface of the transparent insulator substrate; bonding the ion implanting surface of the single crystal silicon substrate and the transparent insulator substrate to each other, such that the surface(s) subjected to the surface activating treatment is/are used as a bonding surface(s); applying an impact to the ion implanted layer; and forming a plurality of diffusion regions having a second conductivity type at the delaminated surface side of the single crystal silicon layer, such that a plurality of first conductivity-type regions and second conductivity-type regions are present at the delaminated surface of the single crystal silicon layer.

Method for producing single crystal silicon solar cell and single crystal silicon solar cell

A method for producing a single crystal silicon solar cell including the steps of: implanting ions into a single crystal silicon substrate through an ion implanting surface thereof; closely contacting the single crystal silicon substrate and a transparent insulator substrate with each other via a transparent adhesive while using the ion implanting surface as a bonding surface; curing the transparent adhesive; applying an impact to the ion implanted layer to mechanically delaminate the single crystal silicon substrate; forming a plurality of diffusion regions having a second conductivity type at the delaminated surface side of the single crystal silicon layer, such that a plurality of first conductivity-type regions and second conductivity-type regions are present at the delaminated surface of the single crystal silicon layer; forming pluralities of individual electrodes on the pluralities of first and second conductivity-type regions, respectively; and forming collector electrodes for the individual electrodes, respectively.

There is disclosed a method for manufacturing a single-crystal silicon solar cell including the steps of: implanting a hydrogen ion or a rare gas ion into a single-crystal silicon substrate; forming a transparent insulator layer on a metal substrate; performing a surface activation treatment with respect to at least one of the ion implanted surface and a surface of the transparent insulator layer; bonding these surfaces; mechanically delaminating the single-crystal silicon substrate to provide a single-crystal silicon layer; forming a plurality of second conductivity type diffusion regions in the delaminated surface side of the single-crystal silicon layer so that a plurality of first conductivity type regions and the plurality of second conductivity regions are present in the delaminated surface of the single-crystal silicon layer; respectively forming a plurality of individual electrodes on the plurality of first and second conductivity type regions of the single-crystal silicon layer; forming respective collecting electrodes; and forming a transparent protective film.

Method for manufacturing single-crystal silicon solar cell and single-crystal silicon solar cell

There is disclosed a single crystal silicon solar cell includes the steps of: implanting hydrogen ions or rare gas ions to a single crystal silicon substrate; performing surface activation on at least one of an ion-implanted surface of the single crystal silicon substrate and a surface of a transparent insulator substrate; bonding the ion-implanted surface of the single crystal silicon substrate and the transparent insulator substrate with the surface-activated surface being set as a bonding surface; applying an impact onto the ion implanted layer to mechanically delaminate the single crystal silicon substrate to form a single crystal silicon layer; forming a plurality of diffusion regions having a second conductivity type on the delaminated plane side of the single crystal silicon layer; forming a plurality of first conductivity type regions and a plurality of second conductivity type regions on the delaminated plane of the single crystal silicon layer; and forming a light reflection film that covers the plurality of first conductivity type regions and the plurality of second conductivity type regions. There can be provided an optical confinement type single crystal silicon solar cell where a thin-film light conversion layer is made of high-crystallinity single crystal silicon.

Method of manufacturing single crystal silicon solar cell and single crystal silicon solar cell

A method for producing a single crystal silicon solar cell including the steps of: implanting ions into a single crystal silicon substrate through an ion implanting surface thereof; closely contacting the single crystal silicon substrate and a transparent insulator substrate with each other via a transparent electroconductive adhesive while using the ion implanting surface as a bonding surface; curing and maturing the transparent electroconductive adhesive into a transparent electroconductive film; applying an impact to the ion implanted layer to mechanically delaminate the single crystal silicon substrate to leave a single crystal silicon layer; and forming a p-n junction in the single crystal silicon layer.

A method for producing a single crystal silicon solar cell including the steps of: implanting ions into a single crystal silicon substrate through an ion implanting surface thereof to form an ion implanted layer in the single crystal silicon substrate; forming a transparent electroconductive film on a surface of a transparent insulator substrate; conducting a surface activating treatment for the ion implanting surface of the single crystal silicon substrate and/or a surface of the transparent electroconductive film on the transparent insulator substrate; bonding the ion implanting surface of the single crystal silicon substrate and the surface of the transparent electroconductive film on the transparent insulator substrate to each other; applying an impact to the ion implanted layer; and forming a p-n junction in the single crystal silicon layer.

A heating plate having a smooth surface is placed on a hot plate which constitutes a heating section, and the smooth surface of the heating plate is closely adhered on the rear surface of a single-crystal Si substrate bonded to a transparent insulating substrate. The temperature of the heating plate is kept at 200&#xb0; C. or higher but not higher than 350&#xb0; C. When the rear surface of the single-crystal Si substrate bonded to the insulating substrate is closely adhered on the heating plate, the single-crystal Si substrate is heated by thermal conduction, and a temperature difference is generated between the single-crystal Si substrate and the transparent insulating substrate. A large stress is generated between the both substrates due to rapid expansion of the single-crystal Si substrate, thus separation takes place at a hydrogen ion-implanted interface.

Method for manufacturing SOI substrate

An object of the present invention is to provide a method by which bonding at a low temperature is possible and an amount of metal contaminants in an SOI film is decreased. An embodiment of the present invention is realized in the following manner. A single crystal silicon substratesurface-activated by a plasma-treatment and a quartz substrateare bonded together at a low temperature, to which an external impact is given to mechanically delaminate silicon film from a single crystal silicon bulk thereby obtaining a semiconductor substrate (SOI substrate) having a silicon film (SOI film). Next, the SOI substrate is subjected to a heat-treatment at a temperature of 600&#xb0; C. to 1250&#xb0; C. so that metal impurities accidentally mixed into an interface of the SOI film and the quartz substrate and into the SOI film in such a step as a plasma-treatment are gettered to a surface region of the silicon film. Then, in the end, a surface layer (gettering layer) of the silicon filmof the SOI substrate after the heat-treatment is removed to finally prepare an SOI filmand a semiconductor substrate (SOI substrate) is obtained.

Method for producing semiconductor substrate

A silicon layer having a conductivity type opposite to that of a bulk is provided on the surface of a silicon substrate and hydrogen ions are implanted to a predetermined depth into the surface region of the silicon substrate through the silicon layer to form a hydrogen ion-implanted layer. Then, an n-type germanium-based crystal layer whose conductivity type is opposite to that of the silicon layer and a p-type germanium-based crystal layer whose conductivity type is opposite to that of the germanium-based crystal layer are successively vapor-phase grown to provide a germanium-based crystal. The surface of the germanium-based crystal layer and the surface of the supporting substrate are bonded together. In this state, impact is applied externally to separate a silicon crystal from the silicon substrate along the hydrogen ion-implanted layer, thereby transferring a laminated structure composed of the germanium-based crystal and the silicon crystal onto the supporting substrate.

Method for manufacturing substrate for photoelectric conversion element

On the side of a surface (the bonding surface side) of a single crystal Si substrate, a uniform ion implantation layer is formed at a prescribed depth (L) in the vicinity of the surface. The surface of the single crystal Si substrate and a surface of a transparent insulating substrate as bonding surfaces are brought into close contact with each other, and bonding is performed by heating the substrates in this state at a temperature of 350&#xb0; C. or below. After this bonding process, an Si&#x2014;Si bond in the ion implantation layer is broken by applying impact from the outside, and a single crystal silicon thin film is mechanically peeled along a crystal surface at a position equivalent to the prescribed depth (L) in the vicinity of the surface of the single crystal Si substrate.

SOI substrate and method for manufacturing SOI substrate

Wettability of a PBN material surface with respect to a metal is improved to expand use applications. Hydrogen ions are implanted into a surface of a silicon substrateto form an ion implanted regionat a predetermined depth near a surface of the silicon substrate, and a plasma treatment or an ozone treatment is performed with respect to a main surface of the silicon substratefor the purpose of surface cleaning or surface activation. The main surfaces of the silicon substrateand a PBN substratesubjected to the surface treatment are appressed against each other to be bonded at a room temperature, and an external impact shock is given to the bonded substrate to mechanically delaminate a silicon filmfrom a bulkof the silicon substrate to be transferred. An obtained PBN composite substrateis diced to form a chip having a desired size, and a refractory metal is metallized on the silicon filmside to be connected with a wiring material.

Growing community of inventors

Gunma, Japan

Koichi Tanaka