The Solid Solubility of Gold in Doped Silicon by Oxide Encapsulation

The solubility of gold has been measured in phosphorus‐doped silicon by the method of oxide encapsulation. At high phosphorus concentrations an enhanced solubility was observed. This enhanced solubility is extremely temperature dependent, increasing from a factor of 1.4 at 1200°C to ≃15 at 800°C in silicon doped with 4×1019 phosphorus/cm3 . A reasonable agreement has been obtained between the measured enhancement and that calculated using the Shockley‐Moll theory.