Applications of Laser Annealing in IC Fabrication

Laser annealing is discussed in the context of potential applications in the fabrication of advanced solid state components and integrated circuits. General aspects of the uniquetemporal and spatial heating distributions that can be obtained with laser heating are presented, and selected examples are given which illustrate the advantage of special time/temperature heating cycles in the processing of specific semiconductor device structures. The performance of silicon and Hgcdte diodes, polysilicon resistors, multiple stacked polysilicon/oxide capacitors, Al/Si ohmic contacts and MOS/SOS transistors fabricated using laser annealing is significantly improved relative to devices fabricatedusing conventional furnace annealing.