Investigation of hydrogen in semiconductors by nuclear techniques

The interaction of hydrogen with shallow and deep level impurities in crystalline semiconductors results in a passivation of their electrical activity by the formation of complexes. Nuclear techniques, like the perturbed γγ angular correlation (PAC) and the channeling of charged particles, have contributed to the understanding of the behaviour and microscopic structure of these complexes. A brief introduction to these techniques will be given.

The results on the behaviour of hydrogen, in both elemental and compound semi-conductors, will be reviewed. For the case of Si, the information obtained on the formation, geometry and stability of acceptor-hydrogen complexes will be discussed more extensively.