Published online by Cambridge University Press: 21 February 2011
A series of boron doped a-Si:H films have been characterized by PDS, FTIR, Raman, and SIMS in order to evaluate the effects of boron incorporation on structural properties and hydrogen bonding. Doping by B2H6 or B(CH3)3 does not significantly enhance the overall disorder of the silicon network showing up in the TO-like Raman halfwidth whereas remarkable changes in local, defect related structures are evident from PDS. An analysis of the data suggests two bands of defects in the pseudogap at low boron concentration and only one band for higher concentration. To account for Fermi level positions, shifts of the hole transport path well into the valence band tail upon doping must be invoked.