Formation of transparent SiO2 thin film at room temperature with excimer lamp irradiation

A transparent SiO2 thin film was grown with Xe-2* excimer lamp and NF3, O-2 mixed gases at room temperature. Unlike the conventional methods such as atomic layer epitaxy (ALE) at low temperature, this method requires only a few minutes for deposition without changing material gases. A Si substrate was placed in a reaction chamber, which was filled with NF3 and O-2 gases. The gases were exposed to the Xe-2* excimer lamp light, and SiF4 and NO2 were produced by photochemical reaction. The SiF4 was adsorbed on the substrate; which reacted with NO2 in gas ambient and was oxidized to form SiO2. The molecular layer was produced per reaction, and by voluntarily repeated reaction, the transparent SiO2 thin film was grown. As a result, the SiO2 film thickness of about 2200 Angstrom was achieved for 15 minutes at room temperature. By annealing the formed SiO2 film, the surface current density of the formed SiO2 decreased; the higher the annealing temperature became, the more the surface density decreased.