Merits of heat assist for melt laser annealing

In this paper, the potential for sub-10-nm junction formation of partial-melt laser annealing (PMLA), which is a combination of solid-phase regrowth and heat-assisted laser annealing (HALA), is demonstrated. HALA and PMLA are effective for reducing laser-energy density for dopant activation and for improving heating uniformity of device structure. The absence of melting at the dopant profile tail for PMLA results in a negligibly small diffusion at this region. A high activation rate is achievable by melting the upper part of the amorphous-silicon layer. The obtained sheet resistance of 10-nm-deep junctions was about 700 Ω/sq. for both n⁺/p and p⁺/n junctions. These results imply that PMLA is applicable for much shallower junction formation.