Hydrogen-induced platelet generation in single-crystal silicon was investigated as a function of the Fermi energy. Platelet formation is observed only for Fermi-level positions of $E_C-E_F<~0.3\mathrm{eV}.$ With decreasing $E_C-E_F$ the platelet density increases monotonically to $2.45\times {10}^{17}{\mathrm{cm}}^{\mathrm{-}3}.$ Experiments performed on electrically compensated silicon demonstrate that the formation of hydrogen-induced platelets is solely controlled by the Fermi energy.

• Received 15 May 2000

DOI:https://doi.org/10.1103/PhysRevB.62.8012