A digital signal-processing analysis technique for the infrared reflectivity characterization of ion implanted silicon

Abstract

A new method for the characterization of ion-implanted silicon is proposed. It is based on analysis of the Fourier spectrum of bilinearly transformed infrared reflectance versus wavenumber data of ion-implanted samples. This non-destructive technique has been applied to previously published infrared reflectance data of 〈111〉 and 〈100〉 oriented Si samples which had been implanted with 2.7 MeV phosphorus and 380 keV silicon ions, respectively, and annealed at 500° C for various lengths of time. The refractive index and thickness of the amorphous layer of the as-implanted samples can be measured directly by means of this technique. The position of boundaries between the amorphous, recrystallized and substrate zones, as well as the position of the carrier concentration peak can be determined for the various annealing times. Depending on the annealing time, the recrystallized layer in 〈111〉 silicon has a refractive index which is between 2% and 4% higher than the substrate refractive index, while the difference in refractive index between the amorphous and recrystallized layers is in the order of 5%. In contrast to these results, the presence of the substrate/recrystallized material interface could not be detected in partially recrystallized 〈100〉 silicon by this method, implying that the refractive index step at the substrate/recrystallized material interface is less than 1%. The step in refractive index at the crystalline/amorphous interface in 〈100〉 silicon implanted with a dose of 0.5 x 1016 cm−2 silicon ions, was measured to be 12%, and it is reduced to 8% after partial regrowth has occurred. These results confirm the data obtained by a model-based least-squares analysis.