Electronic properties of MOS capacitor exposed to Inductively coupled hydrogen plasma

Hydrogen plasma is interested for nano-structure cleaning on semiconductor surface at room temperature. We studied the electronic properties of MOS ca pacitor exposed to hydrogen plasma excited in an Inductively Coupled Plasma (ICP) source. Since ICP can generate plasma with a loop antenna put the ou tside of a quartz chamber, it does not induce heavy metal contamination. By electrical characterization of MOS capacitor, hydrogen related neutral ele ctron traps were induced into SiO2 by the hydrogen plasma exposure, With in creasing incident ion energy, much more neutral electron traps were induced . XPS chemical analysis suggested that SI-H bonds were formed in SiO2 with exposure to the hydrogen plasma. It is speculated that under high field str essing to the SiO2, hydrogenated Si bonds were broken by electron impact an d electrons were trapped to the broken bonds in SiO2. With increasing gas p ressure during the hydrogen plasma exposure, electrical degradation of the SiO2 could be reduced. (C) 1999 Elsevier Science S.A. All rights reserved.