Interface hardening with deuterium implantation

Document Type

Article

Publication Date

8-1-2002

Abstract

Incorporation of deuterium to passivate silicon-dangling bonds at the Si-SiO2 interface through ion implantation before the growth of the gate oxide is the focus of this work. Polycrystalline silicon gate n-channel metal-oxide-semiconductor diodes with 4 nm gate oxide grown on deuterium-implanted p-type silicon (100) substrate were investigated. Deuterium implanted at a light dose of 1 × 1014/cm2 at 25 keV reduced oxide leakage current due to reduction in oxide charge and interface traps. Out-diffusion deuterium during oxidation was observed for lower energy implant. Higher energy implant, on the other hand, causes enhanced substrate damage and prevents deuterium from reaching the Si-SiO2 interface. Formation of Si-D bonds at the interface as well as in bulk oxide seems to reduce bulk electron traps as noticed in constant current strees measurements. Interface state density Nit as obtained from the conductance measurements suggests that implanted deuterium passivates the silicon dangling bonds, thereby reducing the interface charge. The Nit distribution in silicon bandgap shows that there is significant reduction in Nit for deuterium-implanted samples at an energy position about 0.2 eV above midgap, which corresponds well with Pb0 center 0/-transition level of Ev + 0.85 eV.

Identifier

0036688062 (Scopus)

Publication Title

Journal of the Electrochemical Society

External Full Text Location

https://doi.org/10.1149/1.1485084

ISSN

00134651

First Page

G446

Last Page

G450

Issue

8

Volume

149

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