Abstract
Oxygen and carbon are the most common impurities in multi-crystalline silicon. The general mechanism for formation and transport of O and C in the solidification furnace is as follows: oxygen from the silica crucible comes into the melt and combines with a silicon atom and evaporates at the gas/melt interface in the form of silicon oxide (SiO). Argon inert gas, injected into the furnace chamber, carries the SiO to the hot graphite fixtures, where it reacts with carbon to form carbon monoxide (CO) and silicon carbide (SiC). CO is carried by the gas to the melt free surface, where it dissociates into carbon and oxygen. Finally, during solidification oxygen and carbon are incorporated into the crystal. A global furnace model accounting for heat transfer, melt flow, gas flow and impurity transport has been applied to investigate the oxygen and carbon formation and transport in a vertical Bridgman furnace during the holding phase when the furnace is at its hottest. A case study is performed to investigate the effect of the applied heating power on the carbon and oxygen concentrations in the melt prior to solidification.
