ELECTRON-TRANSPORT OF INHOMOGENEOUS ALPHA-FESI2 (111)SI SCHOTTKY BARRIERS/

Continuous buried layers of metallic alpha-FeSi2 were fabricated by Io n Beam Synthesis in (111)Si substrates. Laterally patterned alpha-FeSi 2 Schottky diodes with different areas were fabricated by implantation through an SiO2 mask. While diode characteristics were only observed on n-type Si, on p-type Si nearly ohmic behaviour was observed. The an alysis of I-V curves indicated a strong temperature dependence; in the high temperature range between 360 and 420 K, the contacts showed nea rly ideal behaviour with ideality factors n less than or equal to 1.1 and an exceptionally high Schottky barrier height of Phi(B) = 0.96 +/- 0.02 eV. At lower temperatures we observed non-ideal behaviour of the electron transport through the alpha-FeSi2/(111)Si interfaces, reveal ed by ideality factors larger than 1 and a bias-dependence of the effe ctive Schottky barrier height Phi(eff). All effects can be attributed to Schottky barrier inhomogeneities.