Effect of microwave annealing on SOI MOSFETs: Post-metal annealing with low thermal budget

We investigate the effect of microwave irradiation (MWI) on silicon-on-insulator (SOI) based MOSFETs. The MWI technique is used for post-metal annealing (PMA) in air ambient, and compared with conventional thermal annealing in a forming gas ambient. This type of annealing not only constitutes a low cost, short time, low temperature, vacuum-free alternative to conventional post-metal annealing methods, but it also allows much lower thermal budgets, which, in turn, minimizes dopant motion, redistribution, and diffusion. The MWI treated MOSFETs showed superior electrical characteristics in terms of field effect mobility, on-off ratio, subthreshold swing, interface trap density, stability, and hot carrier effect immunity. Therefore, MWI technology is expected to become a promising annealing method for silicon-based processes, with low cost and low thermal budget.