Annealing of preexisting defects in silicon single crystals by ion irradiation

The annealing of crystalline defects in Si single crystals created by ion implantation at room temperature was investigated. Silicon single crystals were firstly implanted at room temperature with 1.345 MeV Au1+ ions at fluences from 1 × 1013 to 1 × 1014 at/cm2 to induce damage. A second implantation at room temperature was afterwards performed with 10 MeV Co3+ ions at a fluence of 3 × 1014 at/cm2. All samples were analyzed afterwards by Rutherford backscattering in random and channeling geometry to assess the crystalline damage present in the surface region. The results showed a significant reduction of the degree of damage or a reduction of the size of damaged region. The morphology and local atomic structure, studied using high-resolution electron microscopy, selected area electron diffraction and high resolution X-ray diffraction confirmed the reduction of damage degree and volume caused by Au implantation after Co implantation.