Improvement of charge trapping characteristics of N/sub 2/O-annealed and reoxidized N/sub 2/O-annealed thin oxides

Author

Liu, Zhihong ; Wann, Hsing-jen ; Ko, Ping K. ; Hu, Chenming ; Cheng, Yiu Chung

Author_Institution

Dept. of Electr. Eng. & Comput. Sci., California Univ., Berkeley, CA, USA

Volume

13

Issue

10

fYear

1992

Firstpage

519

Lastpage

521

Abstract

It is found that increasing N/sub 2/O annealing temperature and time monotonically reduces electron trapping in the resulting oxides. The improvement increases with oxide thickness. Reoxidation does not enhance but reduces the improvement. The behavior is different from and simpler to understand than that after NH/sub 3/ annealing, apparently due to the absence of deleterious hydrogen. Hole trapping and interface trap generation are also suppressed by N/sub 2/O annealing, though an optimum anneal condition may exist. Charge to breakdown exhibits modest improvement consistent with reduced electron trapping.<>

Keywords

annealing; dielectric thin films; electron energy states of amorphous solids; electron traps; hole traps; oxidation; silicon compounds; N/sub 2/O ambient annealing; Si/sub x/N/sub y/O/sub z/ thin oxides; annealing temperature; annealing time; charge trapping characteristics; electron trapping; electron trapping suppression; hole trapping suppression; interface trap generation suppression; oxide thickness; Annealing; Dielectric substrates; Electric breakdown; Electron traps; Hydrogen; Oxidation; Silicon; Stability; Stress; Voltage;

fLanguage

English

Journal_Title

Electron Device Letters, IEEE

Publisher

ieee

ISSN

0741-3106

Type

jour

DOI

10.1109/55.192820

Filename

192820