Athermal annealing of semiconductors using shock waves generated by a laser-plasma

We are investigating an annealing technique in which shock or sound waves generated by a laser-plasma are used to anneal a semiconductor. The athermal annealing (AA) process occurs very rapidly, which results in almost no diffusion of. dopants. A HeNe laser is used to measure the reflectivity of the silicon as a function of time. Measurements show that the annealing occurs in 1.8 musec, which is the acoustic time scale for waves to propagate from the focus through the AA region. A knife-edge technique is employed to study acoustic waves in the sample by measuring the deflection of the probe beam. Initial results for aluminum samples irradiated at modest laser intensities (200 mJ, 50 nsec) show well-defined surface acoustic waves. However, both silicon and GaAs have more complicated structure which resemble Lamb (plate) waves.