Microscopic Aspects of the Staebler-Wronski Effect

Abstract

ABSTRACTThe microscopic origin and the creation mechanisms of metastable, light-induced defects in hydrogenated amorphous silicon are reviewed. Based on excitonic electron-hole pair recombination, a consistent quantitative description of defect creation kinetics can be obtained, including the experimentally observed differences between continuous wave and pulsed illumination as well as the effect of competing recombination pathways in compensated material. High resolution spin resonance spectra obtained by low-field spin-dependent transport are used to examine the interaction of metastable defects with hydrogen.