Process for cooling a silicon ingot having a vacancy dominated region to produce defect free silicon

摘要

A process for producing silicon which is substantially free of agglomerated intrinsic point defects in an ingot having a vacancy dominated region. An ingot is grown generally in accordance with the Czochralski method. While intrinsic point defects diffuse from or are annihilated within the ingot, at least a portion of the ingot is maintained above a temperature T_A at which intrinsic point defects agglomerate. The achievement of defect free silicon is thus substantially decoupled from process parameters, such as pull rate, and system parameters, such as axial temperature gradient in the ingot.