The effect of ion induced damage on IBIC images

Abstract

Ion induced damage limits the number of charge pulses which can be measured in an IBIC (ion beam induced charge) image because the average measured charge pulse size decreases with cumulative beam dose. The cause and effects of MeV light ion induced damage in Si is reviewed here, and the merits of using MeV protons or MeV α-particles for IBIC is discussed. Results are presented showing how ion induced damage is detectable in a 4 Mbit DRAM (dynamic random access memory) device after a dose of ∼ 100 3 MeV protons/μm 2. A method of compensating for the effects of ion induced damage which enables more ions/μm 2 to be used to generate an IBIC image is described, and results of compensating IBIC images of the DRAM are shown.