Research Interests

Defect engineering of semiconductors, including radiation stimulated annealing and epitaxial growth of silicon, impurity control in silicon via intrinsic and extrinsic gettering processes, point defect/extended defect dynamics during ion implantation and silicidation, and nano-scale contacts and junctions for giga-scale integrated circuit technology.

Background and Research

George Rozgonyi joined the NCSU faculty in 1982 after almost 20 years with AT&T Bell Telephone Laboratories. Currently he is the director of an NSF sponsored Industry/University Co-operative Research Center called SiWEDS for "Silicon Wafer Engineering and Defect Science," which is a consortium of seven universities and seven silicon wafer manufactures; see the SiWEDS website.

The control of dopants, impurities, electrical contacts and defects for Giga-Scale Integration (GSI) of silicon devices requires a complex set of crystal and processing conditions to be satisfied simultaneously. In order to achieve the maximum yield and highest level of electrical performance for a given device design and unit process, Rozgonyi's group has developed a set of defect diagnostic tools, which are available for individual process step evaluation. The resulting chemical, structural and electrical data often seed ideas for exploring new modes of materials processing. Thus, they strive to push Defect Engineering beyond the level of a simple diagnostic feedback to the implementation of innovative new processes. Related examples include dislocation enhanced dopant diffusion, extrinsic gettering of impurities at low temperatures, and silicide formation via diffusion through nano-scale semi-permeable membranes. The generated samples, equipment and human resources used in the above projects provide a rich base for undergraduate student exposure to real-world lab experiences which amplifies their basic physics, chemistry and materials science classroom work.