Behavior and process of background signal formation of hydrogen,carbon, nitrogen,and oxygen in silicon wafers during depth profiling using dual-beam TOF-SIMS

The behavior and mechanism of background signals during depth profiling of atmospheric elements using dual-beam time-of-flight secondary ion mass spectrometry (TOF-SIMS) have been experimentally investigated for silicon wafers. The background signals of atmospheric elements were found to be inversely proportional to the sputtering rate. Most of the background signals are largely attributable to the accumulation of components through adsorption and ion bombardment in the pre-equilibrium state. On the other hand, the contribution of real-time adsorption during the instant after the last sputtering in the equilibrium state is negligible under the present experimental conditions. H₂O is dominant in the background formation process of hydrogen and oxygen, which is supported by the higher adsorption coefficients. The background levels of carbon and nitrogen are lower than those of hydrogen and oxygen. Furthermore, the background signal of carbon with respect to the sputtering rate shows a different trend than the other elements. This could be attributed to accumulation in the pre-equilibrium state. These results indicate that the background levels can be lowered close to those of dynamic-SIMS by using an extremely high sputtering rate in dual-beam TOF-SIMS.