Modified pulsed MOS capacitor for characterization of ultraclean thin p/p⁺ silicon epitaxial layers

We develop a modified pulsed MOS technique for measuring generation lifetime in ultraclean and thin p/p⁺ epitaxial layers, which can be used to detect metallic impurities with densities as low as 10¹⁰ cm^-3. The widely used classic version is shown to be unable to effectively detect such low impurity densities because of the domination of surface generation; whereas, recombination lifetime measurement techniques have serious limitations for layers that have smaller thicknesses than the minority carrier diffusion length.