Experimental and numerical study of aerosol Formation under heterogeneous/h
omogeneous silane thermal decomposition is carried out. Experimental explor
ation included monitoring of the following parameters during silane decompo
sition: silane conversion degree and concentrations of disilane and trisila
ne; aerosol concentration; size and morphology of aerosol particles; number
of monohydride SiH and polyhydride (SiH2)(n) groups in aerosol particles;
number of dangling bond active centers in aerosol particles. To explain the
experimental results, a numerical model was developed. It covered homogene
ous reactions (involving 11 gaseous species), heterogeneous reactions of si
licon wall deposition from gaseous species, aerosol formation and aerosol p
article wall deposition. The modeling results are in reasonable agreement w
ith the experimental data. (C) 2000 Elsevier Science Ltd. All rights reserv
ed.