Quenched-in defects in laser annealed silicon

The generation of defects in Si by pulsed laser irradiation was studied by deep level transient spectroscopy. For irradiation with pulsed ruby laser, three defect levels at Ec −0.25 eV, Ec −0.32 eV, and Ec −0.49 eV were observed. These defects, which generate large leakage current at Schottky diodes, are attributed to quenched-in defects because their energy levels are very close to those generated by quenching-in silicon wafer from a resistance heated furnace. However, they can be annealed out by a thermal annealing in nitrogen ambient at 600 °C.