A REFLECTANCE SPECTROSCOPY-BASED TOOL FOR HIGH-SPEED

CHARACTERIZATION OF SILICON WAFERS AND SOLAR CELLS IN COMMERCIAL

PRODUCTION

1 1 1 1 1 2 2
B. Sopori , P. Rupnowski , D. Guhabiswas , S. Devayajanam , S. Shet, C.P. Khattak , and M. Albert
1
National Renewable Energy Laboratory, Golden, CO
2
GT Solar, Merrimack, NH

ABSTRACT
Figure 2 is a photograph of the commercial system. This
system operates in two modes: (i) Averaging mode: here,
Some new applications of reflectance spectroscopy using
the GT FabScan are described, which make this system a reflectance spectrum (R vs. ) of a large-area sample of
highly desirable for process monitoring in commercial Si a wafer or a cell is acquired. An analysis based on the
solar cell fabrication. These applications include grain results of PV Optics (a software package that handles
orientation, grain size distribution, dislocation density rough and textured solar cell optics) then deconvolves the
distribution, and antireflection coating thickness on a spectrum to determine various in-depth and lateral
finished solar cell. These measurements are performed sample parameters [8]. (ii) Imaging mode: GT FabScan
very fast, typically in less than 10 ms over the entire acquires spectrally filtered reflectance images, which are
wafer. transformed to produce parameter maps. Imaging
capabilities can be used to produce maps of wafer
sawing quality, wafer thickness, dislocation density
INTRODUCTION
distribution, grain orientations and grain size distribution,
AR coating thickness, and back-side reflectance. Typical
We have shown previously [1-7] that reflectance acquisition times for all measurements are <10 ms.
spectroscopy can be used to perform a variety of
measurements of physical parameters of wafers and
solar cells that enable it to monitor solar cell
manufacturing. The National Renewable Energy
Laboratory and GT Solar have jointly developed a new
reflectometer, commercially known as GT FabScan, that
can very rapidly measure several wafer/cell parameters
through the entire solar cell production. This system uses
reflectance spectroscopy and scatterometery to
determine in-depth, and lateral structural parameters of
wafers and cells. These parameters include surface
roughness, texture quality, antireflection (AR) coating
thickness, wafer thickness, cell back reflectance, and
metallization height and area. Figure 1 is a schematic of
the instrument, which is discussed in details in previous
references.

Figure 2 Photograph of a GT FabScan including

identification of various modules. Photo credit:
NREL.

Although reflectance spectroscopy is used extensively to

characterize semiconductors, its use has been limited to
laboratory applications of planar samples because of (i)
availability of only small-beam instruments, which make it
very tedious to analyze large-area samples; and (ii) lack
of optical modeling for non-planar samples of rough or
textured interfaces required to analyze solar wafers and
cells. The GT FabScan overcomes conventional
limitations by using reciprocal optics and incorporating
calculations of PV Optics.
Figure 1 A schematic of the system for reciprocal
configuration.

978-1-4244-5892-9/10/$26.00 2010 IEEE 002238

Figure 3 Defect maps of 156-mm x 156-mm wafers taken from the top, middle, and bottom of a mc-Si brick. The
average dislocation densities of the top, middle, and bottom wafers are 2.9 x 105 cm-2, 4.2 x 105 cm-2, 1.5 x
105 cm-2, respectively.

We recently developed some new applications suitable Because dislocations are primarily generated by the
for use in monitoring commercial solar cell production. thermal stresses during the growth of an ingot, the
These include: measured dislocation distribution can also be applied to
assess the thermal stresses experienced by the crystal
Dislocation mapping during growth. Concomitantly, these maps can be used
to improve the properties of the ingots by lowering the
Grain size measurement dislocation density during crystal growth.

Grain orientation mapping
Mapping AR coating thickness and metallization
coverage of a completed solar cell.
In this paper, we will describe these applications of the
commercial instrument in some detail.
APPLICATION 1: DISLOCATION MAPPING
Dislocation maps and light beam induced current (LBIC)
maps can be very valuable in determining the influence of
cell processing. We have observed that weakly clustered
dislocations have higher than expected LBIC response if
the cluster is of large size. Figure 4 shows a long-
wavelength (= 0.98 mm) LBIC map of a cell that was
fabricated on a wafer next to the TOP wafer shown in
Fig. 3.

The GT FabScan rapidly maps dislocation distribution of

a wafer. The wafer is first defect etched in Sopori etch
(HF:CH3COOH:HNO3 in a 36:15:1 ratio) for 30 s to
produce etch pits at dislocation sites [9]. Defect counting
is done by statistical means using the light scattered by
etch pits [10]. Figure 3 shows dislocation distribution of
three 156-mm x 156-mm wafers taken from the top,
middle, and bottom of a mc-Si brick from a cast ingot.
These maps show how the defect propagation occurs in
the casting procedure. The solidification (growth)
direction is identified in the figure (from the bottom to the
top). One can see that in this casting technique, the
dislocation generation has occurred near the bottom
edges of this brick and then spreads over the rest of the
wafer. Figure 4 LBIC map of a cell fabricated on a wafer next
to the one whose defect map is shown as TOP in
Fig. 3.

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 APPLICATION 2: GRAIN ORIENTATION MAPPING
AND CORRELATION BETWEEN DISLOCATION (a)
GENERATION AND GRAIN ORIENTATION

Grain orientations of a texture-etched mc-Si wafer can be

1 2
accurately determined by the reflectance mapping.
Because texture etching exposes (111) faces, the
reflectance of each grain is characteristic of its
orientation. Figure 5 shows a typical map where each
color represents a specific grain orientation. A detailed
optical analysis was done to determine reflectance of
each orientation. Orientation mapping is very valuable for
improving crystal growth because dislocations are formed
in certain preferred orientations. Figure 6a shows the
dislocation distribution of a 156-mm x 156-mm wafer.
Figure 6b is the grain distribution of another wafer from
the same brick taken close to the wafer in Fig. 6a. Each
3
color in Fig. 6b corresponds to a different orientation.
One can see that certain grains having very high or very
low dislocation density can be easily identified. A few
such grains, labeled as 1, 2, and 3, are identified in both
figures. The regions labeled as 1, 2, and 3 show grains
of near-zero, high, and medium densities, respectively. (b)
In general, dislocation maps show that dislocations also
extend into neighboring grains.
1 2

Figure 5 Grain orientation map of a 156-mm-size
wafer. Grains of the same color have the same
orientation.
APPLICATION 3: GRAIN SIZE DISTRIBUTION
Because we can rapidly map grain orientations and
delineate each grain, we are able to apply this method to
perform a very rapid grain count over the entire wafer. To
achieve this, we have implemented a standard linear
intercept method [9, 10] into the machines software. This
method automatically processes the reflectance image,
calculates and filters gradients along selected lines, and
detects grain boundaries. As a result, the method yields
the total number of grains and an average grain size on a
wafer. An example of such analysis is shown in Fig. 7.
The automatic grain-counting procedure implemented in
the GT FabScan is very sensitive to the surface
conditions. Generally, the higher the contrast between the
grains reflectance and the sharper the map, the more
accurate is the resulting grain count.
Figure 6 Dislocation map of a 156-mm x 156-mm
wafer (a) and its grain distribution map (b) showing
some regions of correspondence between the two
maps.
This technique can be applied to sort the wafers of a brick
or ingot into those from center of the ingot and those from
the edges. The method can also be used to generate
distribution of grain sizes for large batches of wafers and
to correlate it with the effective cell efficiency.
APPLICATION 4: CHARACTERIZATION OF SOLAR
CELLS
We have applied the capabilities of the instrument to
perform detailed analyses of how defects propagate
within a casting, to measure distribution of defects within
a brick/casting, and to establish a relationship between
grain orientation and dislocation density. This system
can also be applied for characterizing solar cell
parameters such as metal fraction and thickness of AR

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coating. Figure 8 is an example of mapping the AR
coating thickness of a cell.
Figure 7 The grain-counting procedure that was
executed on this 4.5-in wafer found 1950 grains with
an average size of 6.0 mm.
Figure 8 Thickness map of the antireflection coating
of a solar cell taken with the GT FabScan.
CONCLUSION
We have described new applications of our reflectometer,
which is now a commercial product under the name
GT FabScan. The system has a typical acquisition time
of <10 ms and is well suited for rapid characterization of
wafers and cells. This instrument can be easily adapted
to online monitoring of a variety of wafer and cell
parameters.
ACKNOWLEDGEMENT
This work was supported by the U.S. Department of
Energy under Contract No. DE-AC36-08-GO28308 with
the National Renewable Energy Laboratory.
978-1-4244-5892-9/10/$26.00 2010 IEEE
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