Preprint – Manuscript submitted to Materials Science in Semiconductor Processing (November 20, 2018) Morphological and electrical properties of Nickel based Ohmic contacts formed by laser annealing process on n-type 4H-SiC S. Rascunà 1*, P. Badalà 1, C. Tringali 1, C. Bongiorno 2, E. Smecca 2, A. Alberti 2, S. Di Franco 2, F. Giannazzo 2, G. Greco 2, F. Roccaforte 2, M. Saggio 1 1 STMicroelectronics SRL, Stradale Primosole 50, 95121 Catania, Italy 2 Consiglio Nazionale delle Ricerche – Istituto per la Microelettronica e Microsistemi (CNR-IMM), Strada VIII, n.5 Zona Industriale, I-95121 Catania, Italy (*) Corresponding author:
[email protected], For the n-type SiC, annealed Ni-films are Abstract. This work reports on the commonly used to form nickel silicide (Ni 2Si) morphological and electrical properties of Ni- back-side Ohmic contacts. Typically, rapid based back-side Ohmic contacts formed by thermal annealing (RTA) exceeding 900°C laser annealing process for SiC power diodes. are used to achieve an Ohmic behavior [3]. Nickel films, 100 nm thick, have been However, today there is the need to replace sputtered on the back-side of heavily doped the conventional thermal annealing by laser 110 µm 4H-SiC thinned substrates after annealing processes carried out on the back- mechanical grinding. Then, to achieve Ohmic side of thinned wafers at the end of the behavior, the metal films have been irradiated fabrication flow [4]. with an UV excimer laser with a wavelength In Fig. 1, a schematic of a standard flow of 310 nm, an energy density of 4.7 J/cm 2 and chart (with and without grinding step) for the pulse duration of 160 ns.