METHOD FOR DEPOSITING SILICON-BASED THIN FILM, METHOD FOR DEPOSITING SILICON-BASED SEMICONDUCTOR LAYER AND PHOTOVOLTAIC ELEMENT

摘要

PROBLEM TO BE SOLVED: To provide a method for depositing a silicon semiconductor layer having excellent photoelectric characteristics at a film deposition rate of an industrially practical level and also to provide a photovoltaic element in which the silicon-based semiconductor layer deposited by the method is used. SOLUTION: In this method, raw-material gas is introduced into a vacuum vessel to deposit the silicon-based semiconductor layer containing a microcrystal on a substrate introduced into the vacuum vessel by a plasma-enhanced CVD method. This method comprises a first step where a first region is deposited by using the raw-material gas containing halogen atoms and a second step where a second region is deposited on the above first region under the condition that the amount of the raw-material gas containing halogen atoms is smaller than that used in the above first step.