Radiation damage in silicon (001) due to low energy (60–510 eV) argon ion bombardment

Abstract

Low energy Ar ion bombardment is increasingly used as a surface preparation prior to thin film deposition, and in the etching of semiconductor materials for modern microelectronic devices. A study of the radiation damage and gas build-up effects associated with low energy (60–510 eV) Ar+ bombardment of Si(001) was carried out using mass-analysed monoenergetic Ar+ beams in conjuction with in situ high depth resolution (~ 3 Å) medium energy ion scattering (MEIS). The bombardment and the analysis were performed under ultra-high vacuum (UHV) conditions. Ion bombardment damage was observed to increase linearly with the ion energy for doses ⩽ 1016cm−2. Significant annealing of the damage for 510 eV, Ar+ 5 × 1015cm−2 was observed in the bombardment temperature range between 300 and 673 K. The FWHM of the damaged layer agreed reasonably with calculated values obtained using the IMPETUS, TRIM and MARLOWE codes.