A quartz glass crucible (1) has a structure wherein a peak of a distribution of a total concentration of Na, K, and Ca in a depth direction from an inner surface (10i) of the crucible is present at a position deeper than the inner surface (10i). In an exemplary embodiment, the quartz glass crucible is capable of improving the yield of a silicon single crystal by suppressing peeling-off of brown rings.

A quartz container manufacturing method and a forming apparatus, relating to the solar photovoltaic technical field, and providing a mold comprising a top cylinder and a mold bottom; during formation of a container blank, when the mold forms a first included angle with a horizontal plane and the mold is rotated at a first rotation speed, the source material forms a first blank on the inner wall of the top cylinder; when the mold forms a second included angle with the horizontal plane and the mold is rotated at a second rotation speed, the source material forms a second blank on the inner wall of the mold bottom; a quartz container is manufactured from a container blank composed of the first blank and the second blank.

A silica glass crucible includes a cylindrical side wall portion, a curved bottom portion, and a corner portion that is provided between the side wall portion and the bottom portion and has a higher curvature than a curvature of the bottom portion, in which a first region provided from a crucible inner surface to a middle in a thickness direction, a second region that is provided outside the first region in the thickness direction and has a different strain distribution from the first region, and a third region that is provided outside the second region in the thickness direction and up to the crucible outer surface and has a different strain distribution from the second region, are provided, and internal residual stresses of the first region and the third region are compressive stresses, whereas an internal residual stress of the second region includes a tensile stress.

A quartz glass crucible (1) includes: a crucible body (10) made of silica glass; and a crystallization-accelerator-containing layer (13) formed on an outer surface of the crucible body (10). A concentration of a crystallization accelerator contained in the crystallization-accelerator-containing layer (13) is 1.0×10.sup.13 atoms/cm.sup.2 or more and 4.8×10.sup.15 atoms/cm.sup.2 or less. The quarts glass crucible is intended to be capable of not only enduring a single crystal pulling-up process that takes a very long time, such as multi-pulling, but also stably controlling the oxygen concentration and crystal diameter of a silicon single crystal by eliminating a gap between the carbon susceptor and the crucible as much as possible.

In an exemplary embodiment, a quartz glass crucible 1 includes: a cylindrical crucible body 10 which has a bottom and is made of quartz glass; and crystallization-accelerator-containing coating films 13A and 13B which are formed on surfaces of the crucible body 10 so as to cause crystallization-accelerator-enriched layers to be formed in the vicinity of the surfaces of the crucible body 10 by heating during a step of pulling up a silicon single crystal by a Czochralski method. The quartz glass crucible is capable of withstanding a single crystal pull-up step undertaken for a very long period of time, such as multi-pulling, and a manufacturing method thereof.

A quartz glass crucible including bottom, curved, and straight body portions, where the quartz glass crucible includes an outer layer including opaque quartz glass containing bubbles, and an inner layer including transparent quartz glass, the outer layer fabricated from different types of raw material powder, the outer layer having regions sectioned by bubble content densities, and bubble content densities of two outer layer adjacent regions, when d.sub.a (pcs/mm.sup.3) is defined as content density of a region “a” having a greater content density, and d.sub.b (pcs/mm.sup.3) is defined as content density of a region “b” having a smaller content density, a difference D=(d.sub.a−d.sub.b)/d.sub.b between content densities of the two regions is 10% or more.

The present invention provides a vitreous silica crucible which can suppress buckling and sidewall lowering of the crucible without fear of mixing of impurities into silicon melt. According to the present invention, provided is a vitreous silica crucible for pulling a silicon single crystal, wherein a ratio I2/I1 is 0.67 to 1.17, where I1 and I2 are area intensities of the peaks at 492 cm.sup.−1 and 606 cm.sup.−1, respectively, in Raman spectrum of vitreous silica of the region having a thickness of 2 mm from an outer surface to an inner surface of a wall of the crucible.

A destructive inspection method of a vitreous silica crucible for pulling a silicon single crystal evaluates a crack state of an inner surface of the vitreous silica crucible supported by a graphite susceptor when a load is instantaneously applied to at least one point on the inner surface via an automatic center punch while pushing the tip portion of the automatic center punch against the inner surface. The destructive inspection method can inspect the vitreous silica crucible under conditions as close to the actual conditions of use as possible.

A method of manufacturing of a vitreous silica crucible includes: fusing silica powder under a reduced pressure of −50 kPa or more and less than −95 kPa to form a transparent vitreous silica layer as an inner layer; fusing silica powder under a reduced pressure of 0 kPa or more and less than −10 kPa to form a bubble-containing vitreous silica layer as an intermediate layer; and fusing silica powder under a reduced pressure of −10 kPa or more and less than −50 kPa to form a semi-transparent vitreous silica layer as an outer layer.

A method for measuring a three-dimensional shape of an inner surface of a vitreous silica crucible which enables the measurement of the three-dimensional shape of the inner surface of the crucible without contaminating the inner surface of the crucible, is provided. According to the present invention, a method for measuring a three-dimensional shape of a vitreous silica crucible, including a fogging step to form a fog onto an inner surface of the vitreous silica crucible, a three-dimensional shape measuring step to measure a three-dimensional shape of the inner surface, by measuring a reflected light from the inner surface irradiated with light, is provided.