Room Temperature Deposition Process for Manufacturing Silicon Nitride Films Using Pulsed Plasma and Neural Network

As a deposition layer, silicon nitride (SiN) films are widely used in manufacturing silicon solar cells. To develop a cost-effective manufacturing process, deposition processes at lower temperatures is demanded. For this purpose, we report film properties of SiN films deposited at room temperature using pulsed plasma. In particular, the effect of duty ratio, a primary control variable in the pulsed plasma, on deposition rate and ion energy is examined. In an attempt to optimize the impact of ion energy on deposition rate, an empirical neural network model is constructed. A fairly large deposition rate is reported as well as several correlations between ion energy and deposition rate.