Silicide formation from laser thermal processing of Ti/Co bilayers

A bilayered CoTi silicide structure consisting of an amorphous CoTi silicide and a highly textured CoTi silicide was found after pulsed excimer laser annealing of titanium/cobalt/silicon stack at high fluence of 0.6 J/cm(2). The highly textured CoTi silicide is monocrystalline and fully coherent with the Si(111) plane of the substrate but has a large amount of microstructural defects. The constitutional supercooling phenomenon is the solidification mechanism responsible for the highly textured CoTi silicide. The incomplete crystallization shown by the presence of the amorphous CoTi silicide is attributed to a high concentration of titanium impurity. (C) 2004 The Electrochemical Society.