Oxidation-enhanced Si self-diffusion in isotopically modulated silicon nanopillars

Abstract

Silicon (Si) self-diffusivity in a Si nanopillar under dry oxidation was quantitatively evaluated by atom probe tomography of Si isotope heterostructure interfaces. Dry oxidation of a nanopillar with 200 nm diameter at 920 °C for 4 h revealed that the Si self-diffusivity was the same as the one measured for the standard planar oxidation despite the fact that the diffusion region probed in the pillar was surrounded by approximately seven times more oxidation interface areas than the simple planar oxidation case. This finding can be understood by considering the large diffusion length of ∼300 μm of the interstitials for our thermal oxidation condition. The excess interstitials injected by the pillar oxidation as well as those injected by the oxidation of the base (100) plane can easily diffuse through the sample, including interiors of the pillars, making the concentration of the excess interstitials practically equal to those injected for the (100) planar oxidation case.