Evidence of Silicon Nitride as a Hydrogen Getter during High‐Temperature Heating via Boron Hydrogenation Experiments

Abstract

Boron acceptor deactivation in crystalline silicon by hydrogen under avalanche electron injection and Fowler‐Nordheim tunneling electron injection stress were measured on four types of metal/nitride/oxide/silicon capacitors of 300A dielectric thickness with 99 or 199A nitride layers, with or without a 15 min heating at 960°C. For capacitors without 960°C heating, a large amount of boron acceptors were deactivated by hydrogen during injection stress, while negligible hydrogenation was observed for capacitors heated at 960°C. These suggest that the hydrogen in the oxide layer which contributed to hydrogenation in the unheated capacitors was gettered by silicon nitride during the 15 min heating at 960°C.