ABSTRACT
Image processing and image analysis offer important opportunities for the assessment of defect density and quantitative characterisation of the geometric structure and of the arrangement of defects in electronic materials. Defects in materials are classified with respect to their dimensionality. Volume, interface and line densities can be calculated from data obtained by counting of features on the surface or planar cross sections. Focussing on line defects in single crystals, the opportunities and limitation of automatic image analysis for determining dislocation densities in semiconductors are outlined. Advantages offered by mathematical morphology in processing and analysing images of etch pits and useful parameters for describing the local arrangement of dislocations are discussed.
