Compositional analysis of HfxSiyO1−x−y thin films by medium energy ion scattering (MEIS) analysis

HfxSiyO1−x−y layers with thicknesses of 2 and 10 nm were measured by medium energy ion scattering (MEIS) with a toroidal electrostatic analyzer (TEA), in which the yield of MEIS spectra was found to decrease with decreasing energy in contrast to conventional Rutherford backscattering spectrometry (RBS), due to the increase in neutralized particles.The HfxSiyO1−x−y spectra obtained by MEIS were corrected with a ratio of the simulated MEIS yield to measured yield for a virgin Si at each energy. The corrected HfxSiyO1−x−y spectra were analyzed and the compositions for 2 and 10 nm thick HfxSiyO1−x−y were obtained by MEIS. An interface layer was found to exist between the Si substrate and the HfxSiyO1−x−y layer.