Advances in low temperature processing of silicon nitride based dielectrics and their applications in surface passivation and integrated optical devices

The passivation of silicon by low temperature processed dielectrics, partic ularly SSI, has recently received a great deal of attention for application s in photovoltaics technology. Low surface recombination velocity is a key issue for ongoing improvements of a large variety of silicon based microele ctronic devices. This review discusses the various deposition techniques an d also gives recent results of nitride passivation. Issues such as the impa ct of deposition parameters, thermal stability, interface traps and surface recombination velocity measurements are described. The benefits achieved b y the passivation process on the photovoltaic device performance are also d iscussed. The potential of silicon oxynitride, a gradient index material, fbr the fab rication of integrated optical devices has been presented. Advances in the growth of SiON for application to integrated optics have been summarized. B ased on optimized SiON technology the review reports on special purpose wav e-guiding structures such as microcavity resonators, electrooptic modulator s, polarization splitters and second harmonic generation devices. SiON tech nology offers a silicon-compatible technology, a waveguiding structure with high dielectric-index contrast, a low optical loss < 0.15 dB cm(-1),in the 1550 nm telecommunication window and a negligible polarization dependence.