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Observed damage during Argon gas cluster depth profiles of compound semiconductors

Lookup NU author(s): Dr Anders Barlow, Dr Jose Portoles, Professor Peter Cumpson

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Abstract

Argon Gas Cluster Ion Beam (GCIB) sources have become very popular in XPS and SIMS in recent years, due to the minimal chemical damage they introduce in the depth-profiling of polymer and other organic materials. These GCIB sources are therefore particularly useful for depth-profiling polymer and organic materials, but also (though more slowly) the surfaces of inorganic materials such as semiconductors, due to the lower roughness expected in cluster ion sputtering compared to that introduced by monatomic ions. We have examined experimentally a set of five compound semiconductors, cadmium telluride (CdTe), gallium arsenide (GaAs), gallium phosphide (GaP), indium arsenide (InAs), and zinc selenide (ZnSe) and a high-kappa dielectric material, hafnium oxide (HfO), in their response to argon cluster profiling. An experimentally determined HfO etch rate of 0.025 nm/min (3.95 x 10(-2) amu/atom in ion) for 6 keV Ar gas clusters is used in the depth scale conversion for the profiles of the semiconductor materials. The assumption has been that, since the damage introduced into polymer materials is low, even though sputter yields are high, then there is little likelihood of damaging inorganic materials at all with cluster ions. This seems true in most cases; however, in this work, we report for the first time that this damage can in fact be very significant in the case of InAs, causing the formation of metallic indium that is readily visible even to the naked eye. (C) 2014 AIP Publishing LLC.

Publication metadata

Author(s): Barlow AJ, Portoles JF, Cumpson PJ

Publication type: Article

Publication status: Published

Journal: Journal of Applied Physics

Year: 2014

Volume: 116

Issue: 5

Online publication date: 06/08/2014

Acceptance date: 23/07/2014

ISSN (print): 0021-8979

ISSN (electronic): 1089-7550

Publisher: American Institute of Physics

URL: http://dx.doi.org/10.1063/1.4892097

DOI: 10.1063/1.4892097

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