Rapid Diffusion and Gettering Studies of Bulk Oxygen in Silicon by Cs/SIMS

The analysis of the light elements in materials has always been of ultimate importance due to their ubiquitous nature in nature and the environment. However, the analysis also is confounded or made more difficult by the presence of these species in the residual vacuum or sample environment of an analytical system. Modern instrumentation, in particular, high performance secondary ion mass spectrometers, employ a variety of experimental conditions which have made the analysis of these species more attainable. In this paper we would like to address the characterization of oxygen unintentionally incorporated in silicon during the CZOCHRALSKI (Cz) silicon growth method with the oxygen coming from the silica quartz crucible used to contain the melt. Although this oxygen is unintentionally incorporated in the silicon, it is known to have beneficial qualities on the resultant material. In particular, the oxygen supposedly adds structural strength to the silicon and through a variety of processing and thermal cycling the oxygen can be made to precipitate into regions which allow the stress resulting from this precipitation to getter impurities unintentionally incorporated during device fabrication.