Production of low-energy fragment-ion beams from hexamethyldisiloxane and the irradiation of SiO+ ion beam to substrates with supplemental oxygen gas for SiO2 film formation

Abstract

In this work, low-energy fragment-ion beams were produced from hexamethyldisiloxane (HMDSO) used as a source material and substrates were irradiated by these beams with supplemental oxygen gas for the formation of silicon dioxide (SiO2) film. During this process, SiO+ ions having an energy of 50 eV were mass-selected from various fragments derived from the decomposition of HMDSO. These ions were subsequently transferred to a Si substrate at room temperature in conjunction with a supplemental oxygen flow. The resulting film was assessed by Fourier-transform infrared spectroscopy and X-ray photoelectron spectroscopy to confirm SiO2 deposition. The bonding of incident SiO+ ions with a quartz crystal microbalance (QCM) was assessed at ion energies of 50, 100 and 200 eV, and the sticking probability of incident SiO+ ions to the QCM crystal substrate was found to decrease monotonically with increasing energy.