Despite the vast knowledge accumulated on silicon, germanium, and their alloys, these materials still demand research, eminently in view of the improvement of knowledge on silicon germanium alloys and the potentialities of silicon as a substrate for high-efficiency solar cells and for compound semiconductors and the ongoing development of nanodevices based on nanowires and nanodots.

Silicon, Germanium, and Their Alloys: Growth, Defects, Impurities, and Nanocrystals covers the entire spectrum of R&D activities in silicon, germanium, and their alloys, presenting the latest...

Polycrystalline silicon (commonly called "polysilicon") is the material of choice for photovoltaic (PV) applications. Polysilicon is the purest synthetic material on the market, though its processing through gas purification and decomposition (commonly called "Siemens" process) carries high environmental risk. While many current optoelectronic applications require high purity, PV applications do not and therefore alternate processes and materials are being explored for PV grade silicon. Solar Silicon Processes: Technologies, Challenges, and Opportunities reviews current and...

A self-consistent, microscopic model of individual- and -reacted point defects requires a reliable connection with the experimentally deduced structural, spectroscopic and thermodynamic properties of the defect centres, to allow their unambiguous identification.

Aim of this book is to focus on the properties of defects in semiconductors of the fourth group under a physico-chemical approach, capable to demonstrate whether the full acknowledgement of their chemical nature could account for several problems encountered in practice or would suggest further experimental or theoretical...