Ion-beam induced annealing of radiation damage in silicon on sapphire

Abstract

Ion-beam induced epitaxial regrowth of radiation damaged layers in silicon on sapphire has been performed at low temperatures using 300 keV 20Ne + ions. The damage was produced by implanting 300 keV 29Si + ions to a dose of 1×10 15 ions/cm 2 at room temperature. The depth distributions of damage were measured by the channeling technique. The implantations preserved the crystal structure in a thin surface layer and the main epitaxial regrowth proceeded from this layer towards the silicon/sapphire interface. The amount of epitaxial regrowth was determined from the backscattering spectra using damage depth profile calculations. Comparison of the experimental results with energy deposition calculations indicated that the annealing of the damaged layers was related to the energy deposited in elastic collisions by the annealing ion beam.