An atomically controlled Si film formation process at low temperatures using atmospheric-pressure VHF plasma.

To grow epitaxial Si films with atomic- and electronic-level perfection, a high-temperature chemical vapor deposition (CVD) process (>1000 °C) has been generally employed. To reduce the growth temperature below 600 °C but keeping a high deposition rate, other energy sources than thermal heating are required. Atmospheric pressure plasma CVD (AP-PCVD) is considered to be suitable for fabricating high-quality films at high deposition rates due both to the high radical density and to the low ion bombardment against the film surface, because the collision frequency among ions and neutral atoms is high. The present study focuses on the low-temperature growth of epitaxial Si, and experimentally demonstrates that AP-PCVD is capable of growing epitaxial Si films with high perfection applicable for semiconductor devices. It is found that the pre-growth cleaning of the Si surface by H(2) AP plasma is effective to grow high-purity Si films, and that the exposure of a film-growing surface to AP plasma during growth is important to form particle-free and defect-free Si films. From the experimental results and the first-principles molecular dynamics simulations of surface atomic reactions, it can be mentioned that both H atoms in the AP plasma and high-density He atoms having thermal kinetic energy contribute to the reduction of growth temperature by supplying considerable energy to the surface.