Lisa O'Reilly

Highly conductive Sb-doped layers in strained Si

The ability to create stable, highly conductive ultrashallow doped regions is a key requirement for future silicon-based devices. It is shown that biaxial tensile strain reduces the sheet resistance of highly doped n-type layers created by Sb or As implantation. The improvement is stronger with Sb, leading to a reversal in the relative doping efficiency of these n-type impurities. For Sb, the primary effect is a strong enhancement of activation as a function of tensile strain. At low processing temperatures, 0.7% strain more than doubles Sb activation, while enabling the formation of stable, ∼10-nm-deep junctions. This makes Sb an interesting alternative to As for ultrashallow junctions in strain-engineered complementary metal-oxide-semiconductor devices.

Constraints on micro-Raman strain metrology for highly doped strained Si materials

Ultraviolet (UV), low penetration depth, micro-Raman spectroscopy, and high-resolution x-ray diffraction (HRXRD) are utilized as complementary, independent stress characterization tools for a range of strained Si samples doped by low energy (2keV) Sb ion implantation. Following dopant implantation, good agreement is found between the magnitudes of strain measured by the two techniques. However, following dopant activation by annealing, strain relaxation is detected by HRXRD but not by micro-Raman. This discrepancy mainly arises from an anomalous redshift in the Si Raman peak position originating from the high levels of doping achieved in the samples. This has serious implications for the use of micro-Raman spectroscopy for strain characterization of highly doped strained Si complementary metal-oxide semiconductor devices and structures therein. We find a direct correlation between the Si Raman shift and peak carrier concentration measured by the differential Hall technique, which indicates that UV micro-R...

Enhanced antimony activation for ultra-shallow junctions in strained silicon

Sheet resistance (Rs) reductions are presented for antimony and arsenic doped layers produced in strained Si. Results re-emphasise the Rs reduction for As comes purely as a result of mobility improvement whereas for Sb, a superior lowering is observed from improvements in both mobility and activation. For the first time, strain is shown to enhance the activation of dopant atoms whilst Sb is seen to create stable ultra-shallow junctions. Our results propose Sb as a viable alternative to As for the creation of highly activated, low resistance ultra-shallow junctions for use with strain-engineered CMOS devices.

The use of wide-bandgap CuCl on silicon for ultra-violet photonics

γ-CuCl is a wide-bandgap (Eg = 3.395eV), direct bandgap, semiconductor material with a cubic zincblende lattice structure. Its lattice constant, aCuCl = 0.541 nm, means that the lattice mismatch to Si (aSi = 0.543 nm) is <0.5%. γ-CuCl on Si-the growth of a wide-bandgap, direct bandgap, optoelectronics material on silicon substrates is a novel material system, with compatibility to current Si based electronic/optoelectronics technologies. The authors report on early investigations consisting of the growth of polycrystalline, CuCl thin films on Si (100), Si (111), and quartz substrates by physical vapour deposition. X-ray diffraction (XRD) studies indicate that CuCl grows preferentially in the <111> direction. Photoluminescence (PL) and Cathodoluminescence (CL) reveal a strong room temperature Z3 excitonic emission at ~387nm. A demonstration electroluminescent device (ELD) structure based on the deposition of CuCl on Si was developed. Preliminary electroluminescence measurements confirm UV light emission at wavelengths of ~380nm and ~387nm, due to excitonic behaviour. A further emission occurs in the bandgap region at ~360nm.

An X-Ray Topographic Analysis of the Crystal Quality of Globally Available SiC Wafers

We present herein a first comparative analysis of the quality of 50 mm and 75 mm diameter SiC wafers, purchased directly from vendors across the world, types including the most widely available configurations. Large Area White Beam Synchrotron Back Reflection X-Ray Topography was used to analyse selected ~1cm2 regions at various locations on up to 10 different bulk SiC wafers. The study concentrated particularly on the density and distribution of threading screw dislocations (TSDs). We also examined all wafers for basal plane dislocation (BPDs) densities and distributions. Alarmingly large variation in wafer quality was observed. TSD densities vary from a minimum of 0 cm-2 (in a-plane material) to values as large as over 2,000 cm-2 on some n-type 4H-SiC wafers. TSD densities on individual wafers can also vary by similar magnitudes, e.g. 500cm-2 to 2,500 cm-2 on two regions only 2 cm apart on a 50 mm diameter wafer. Computer-based image process analysis was used to present a statistical analysis of the distributions of defects. For example algorithms created in MATLAB®, Image Processing Toolbox, isolated possible TSD locations allowing rapid counting to be performed. These counts were confirmed by manual counting of selected unmodified images.

Structural and optoelectronic properties of sputtered copper (I) chloride

Copper (I) Chloride is a wide band gap semiconductor with great potential for silicon-based optoelectronics due to the fact that is closely lattice matched with silicon. This work examines the deposition of CuCl thin films by magnetron sputtering on silicon and glass substrates. Film structural and morphological properties are studied with X-ray diffraction and atomic force microscopy. Optical absorbance and luminescence spectra of CuCl thin films are analysed in order to study the excitonic features. The influence of deposition process parameters and post annealing on the film properties are also reported.

An evaluation of an automated detection algorithm to count defects present in X-Ray topographical images of SiC wafers

Full semiconductor wafer defect/dislocation characterization is difficult to implement manually. We present an analysis of an automated algorithm used to extract Threading Screw Dislocation defect data from Synchrotron White Beam X-Ray Topographical images of SiC wafers. This extraction involves a two-fold process; firstly the algorithm highlights the appropriate defect and secondly updates the counter to provide a final result of defect count. The result of the automated algorithm is compared to hand counts in all cases, thus allowing a critical analysis of the technique. Improvements to this algorithm have been made since last reported by the same authors [1], which are discussed. The analysis herein was also performed on a much larger sample of SiC wafer images than previously used by the same authors [1] allowing a better judgment of performance and critical evaluation. The algorithm is also compared with the original previous algorithm that was used [1]. The success of this methodology paves the way for a complete analysis of whole SiC wafers, which previously was extremely difficult due to image analysis inaccuracy or the bottleneck presented by manual counting. INTRODUCTION Silicon Carbide is a promising material for a variety of electronic applications. Properties [3, 8] include a large bandgap, high electrical breakdown, low chemical reactivity and a high operating temperature. Growth however is prone to defects, common defects include Micropipes, Basal Plane Dislocations (BPD), Stacking Faults (SF) and Threading Screw Dislocations (TSD) [2-4]. Synchrotron White Beam X-Ray Topography (SWXRT) can be used to analyze SiC wafers [4, 9, 10] allowing a large image to be created of a wafer by joining smaller images. In SWXRT TSDs and BPDs [6] show up as dots and lines [5]. Being non-destructive its advantages over other techniques, e.g. KOH etching [7], are obvious. However quantitative analysis (e.g. TSD count) is extremely time consuming and tedious making SWXRT unsuited to examination of large quantities/areas of wafers. It is therefore a massive advantage if an automated method can be established to perform quantitative analysis of SWXRT images. An algorithm to classify Basal Plane Dislocations was discussed in a previous paper [1]. However the TSD algorithm developed in [1] was only semi-automatic. The complete automation of this algorithm and a demonstration of its usefulness is outlined in this paper. Mater. Res. Soc. Symp. Proc. Vol. 994