Local Vibrations of Oxygen-Containing Thermal Donors in Germanium

Abstract

The vibrational absorption bands associated with some types of double thermal donors (TD) in Ge enriched with the oxygen isotopes ¹⁶O and ¹⁸O have been identified. The thermal donors were formed during heat treatment of Ge:O crystals at 300 and 350°C. Absorption spectra were measured at room temperature and at 10 K. The formation of the thermal donors was accompanied by the appearance of three absorption bands, which in the Ge:¹⁶O spectra at room temperature are located at 600, 740, and 780 cm⁻¹. In low-temperature measurements, the bands at 600 and 780 cm⁻¹ exhibited splitting into series of narrow lines (up to 9) associated with some types of thermal donors (TD1–TD9). The absorption spectra measured at 10 K after different cooling conditions display bistability of the first four types of thermal donors (TD1–TD4). In the samples cooled by illumination with light in the region of frequencies of the fundamental absorption of Ge, pairs of lines are observed that belong to the bistable thermal donors in the helium-like configuration of double donors (DD). After cooling the samples in the dark, these pairs of lines are replaced by three new bands, which belong to local vibrational modes of bistable thermal donors in the low-energy neutral configuration. Based on the isotopic shift of the local vibrational modes of the thermal donors in Ge:¹⁶O and Ge:¹⁸O, a rigorous proof of the oxygen atoms entering into the composition of thermal donors is obtained.