Abstract
Hydrogen lithography has been used to template phosphine-based surface chemistry to fabricate atomic-scale devices, a process we abbreviate as atomic precision advanced manufacturing (APAM). Here, we use mid-infrared variable angle spectroscopic ellipsometry (IR-VASE) to characterize single-nanometer thickness phosphorus dopant layers (δ-layers) in silicon made using APAM compatible processes. A large Drude response is directly attributable to the δ-layer and can be used for nondestructive monitoring of the condition of the APAM layer when integrating additional processing steps. The carrier density and mobility extracted from our room temperature IR-VASE measurements are consistent with cryogenic magneto-transport measurements, showing that APAM δ-layers function at room temperature. Finally, the permittivity extracted from these measurements shows that the doping in the APAM δ-layers is so large that their low-frequency in-plane response is reminiscent of a silicide. However, there is no indication of a plasma resonance, likely due to reduced dimensionality and/or low scattering lifetime.
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Acknowledgments
A.M.K. thanks P. S. Davids and M. D. Goldflam for helpful discussion regarding IR carrier response of thin films. The Far-reaching Applications, Implications and Realization of Digital Electronics at the Atomic Limit (FAIR DEAL) project is supported by Sandia's Laboratory Directed Research and Development Program and was performed in part at the Center for Integrated Nanotechnologies, a U.S. DOE Office of Basic Energy Sciences user facility. Sandia National Laboratories is a multimission laboratory managed and operated by the National Technology and Engineering Solutions of Sandia, LLC., a wholly owned subsidiary of Honeywell International, Inc., for the U.S. Department of Energy's National Nuclear Security Administration under Contract No. DE-NA0003525. This paper describes objective technical results and analysis. Any subjective views or opinions that might be expressed in the paper do not necessarily represent the views of the U.S. Department of Energy or the United States Government.
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Katzenmeyer, A.M., Luk, T.S., Bussmann, E. et al. Assessing atomically thin delta-doping of silicon using mid-infrared ellipsometry. Journal of Materials Research 35, 2098–2105 (2020). https://doi.org/10.1557/jmr.2020.155
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1557/jmr.2020.155