Stability of zirconium silicate films on Si under vacuum and O-2 annealing

The effect of postdeposition annealing in vacuum and in dry O-2 on the atom ic transport and chemical stability of chemical vapor deposited ZrSixOy fil ms on Si is investigated. Rutherford backscattering spectrometry, narrow nu clear resonance profiling, and low energy ion scattering spectroscopy were used to obtain depth distributions of Si, O, and Zr in the films. The chemi cal environment of these elements in near-surface and near-interface region s was identified by angle-resolved x-ray photoelectron spectroscopy. It is shown that although the interface region is rather stable, the surface regi on presents an accumulation of Si after thermal annealing. (C) 2001 America n Institute of Physics.