AVS 49th International Symposium
    Surface Science Monday Sessions
       Session SS2-MoA

Paper SS2-MoA1
The Effects of Copper on the Hydrogen-Passivation of Si(001)

Monday, November 4, 2002, 2:00 pm, Room C-110

Session: Nucleation & Growth of Metals on Oxides & Semiconductors
Presenter: A.R. Laracuente, Naval Research Laboratory
Authors: A.R. Laracuente, Naval Research Laboratory
L.A. Baker, Naval Research Laboratory
L.J. Whitman, Naval Research Laboratory
Correspondent: Click to Email
Foreign adsorbates can alter the morphology of surfaces and often have a dramatic impact on film growth. Given that most semiconductor devices are fabricated in hydrogen-rich environments on silicon substrates, it is important to understand how adsorbates affect the surface morphology of H-terminated Si surfaces. Currently, we are studying how copper modifies the morphology of monohydride-terminated Si(001). In the experiments, clean Si(001) surfaces are first exposed to 0.3 monolayer of Cu and then passivated with atomic H under conditions that produce a monohydride surface. The samples are characterized at room temperature using scanning tunneling microscopy (STM) and Auger electron spectroscopy (AES). We find that the main effect of Cu pre-exposure is the formation of pits on the surface. The pits are about 3 nm x 3 nm in size and one atomic layer deep. It appears that Cu induces Si etching during the atomic H exposure. Furthermore, the "pitted" H-terminated surface is subsequently dosed with Cu to investigate the effects of the pits on the growth of Cu. We will present our STM and AES results, and an analysis of the pit size distribution.