Vacancy-engineering implants for high boron activation in silicon on insulator

The formation of boron interstitial clusters is a key limiting factor for the fabrication of highly conductive ultrashallow doped regions in future silicon-based device technology. Optimized vacancy engineering strongly reduces boron clustering, enabling low-temperature electrical activation to levels rivalling what can be achieved with conventional preamorphization and solid-phase epitaxial regrowth. An optimized 160 keV silicon implant in a 55/145 nm silicon-on-insulator structure enables stable activation of a 500 eV boron implant to a concentration 5 1020 cm−3. © 2006 American Institute of Physics. DOI: 10.1063/1.2178487