Barrier to Migration of the Silicon Self-Interstitial

The first total-energy calculations of barriers to interstitial migration have been used to study silicon self-interstitial migration. Migration occurs through the low-electron-density path. Relaxation was found to be important in determining the barrier for both Si^ (0) and Si^ (++). Electron-assisted migration has been demonstrated. Si^ (++) was found to have lower energy at the tetrahedral site while Si^ (0) has lower energy at the hexagonal site.