Rapid thermal processing to improve the epitaxy of (100) silicon on (11̄02) sapphire

Abstract
The heteroepitaxial quality of (100) Si films on (11̄02) sapphire substrates (SOS) as measured by Rutherford backscattering (RBS) and x-ray pole figure analysis is improved by a rapid thermal anneal (RTA) after deposition which brings the Si temperature above 1350 °C for at least several seconds. For a 6000-Å (100) SOS film the (100) aligned to random RBS yield improves from 10% and 54% at the front and back interfaces, to as low as 3.2% and 13% after the RTA. The microtwin volume shows a corresponding decrease to under 1% from the as-grown value of 2.7%. A model based on isothermal solid phase epitaxial regrowth from the untwinned material near the front surface is proposed to account for these results.

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