Critical energy for damage at silicon surfaces bombarded with low-energy argon ions

Positron-annihilation technique has been used to study the recovery of defects in -irradiated n-type GaAs specimens. The Doppler-broadened lineshape parameterS, shows a smooth recovery of defects over the temperature region 120–600° C. The lifetime measurements have also been performed to characterise the types of defects present. The positron mean lifetime_m follows the behaviour of the S parameter, indicating a rather complex defect structure recovery. The variation in the defect specific parameter,R, with temperature is also consistent with these observations.