Prolonged and rapid thermal annealing of boron implanted silicon

Abstract

We studied the annealing of silicon substrates implanted with a medium dose of boron ions (3 X 10 14 cm-², 150 keV) employing conventional furnace annealing (FA) and rapid thermal annealIng (RTA) processes performed in a nitrogen atmosphere. The annealing efficiency was monitored by visual inspection of the implanted surface with an optical microscope after steam oxidation and Secco etching. The FA is more efficient when performed at a high temperature, but even so, It IS not capable of suppressing completely the implantation damage. On the other hand, the RTA was observed to be more efficient than any FA cycle. We discuss this fact taking into account the influence of the very high heating rates (~250 °C/s) the samples underwent dunng the RT A cycle on the annealing behavior of implantation damage.