Published online by Cambridge University Press: 28 February 2011
Reflectance spectroscopy has been used to obtain the dielectric function of the solid phase of porous silicon. The method is based on a fit of a parameterized dielectric function model to measured spectra. A crucial step in the procedure is the 'dielectric averaging' of the microscopic dielectric function of the pore wall material to the macroscopic effective dielectric function which governs the optical properties.
Results are given for heavily and moderately p-doped samples of various porosities. For the latter large differences to bulk silicon have been found. The obtained dielectric functions are compared to the results of band structure calculations taken from literature.