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We present measurements of energy loss and straggling of Si ions in gases. An energy range from 0.5 to 12 MeV/u was covered using the 6 MV EN tandem accelerator at ETH Zurich, Switzerland, and the K130 cyclotron accelerator facility at the University of Jyvaskyla, Finland. Our energy-loss data compare well with calculation based on the SRIM and PASS code. The new straggling measurements support a pronounced peak in He gas at around 4 MeV/u predicted by recent theoretical calculations. The straggling curve structure in the other gases (N-2, Ne, Ar, Kr) is relatively flat in the covered energy range. Although there is a general agreement between the straggling data and the theoretical calculations, the experimental uncertainties are too large to confirm or exclude the predicted weak multi-peak structure in the energy-loss straggling. (C) 2016 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved., Funding Agencies|EU 7th framework programme Integrating Activities - Transnational Access; Academy of Finland under the Finnish Centre of Excellence Programme

Experimental linear energy transfer values of heavy ions in silicon are presented with comparison to estimations from different semi empirical codes widely used among the community. This paper completes the experimental LET data for the RADEF cocktail ions in silicon.

QC 20160216

Researchers performing radiation testing on electronic components often rely on semi-empirical prediction codes for determining the linear energy transfer (LET) (or electronic stopping force) of ions, without paying much attention to their reliability. However, it is seen that estimations calculated with different codes can have over 10% discrepancies, especially in the case of heavy ions with higher LET (e.g., xenon). As a consequence of the modern component fabrication techniques this has become an important issue when studying the radiation durability of electronics. In order to clarify this inconsistency, LET measurements for Xe-131 and Kr-82 in silicon have been undertaken and obtained results are presented, discussed and compared with earlier predicted data.

The stopping of 28Si ions in polycrystalline Si foils has been measured over the energy range 0.1-3.3 MeV per nucleon. For the low energy interval (0.1-0.5 MeV per nucleon), time of flight-energy elastic recoil detection analysis method was used, whilst for the high energy region (1.2-3.3 MeV per nucleon) the energy loss in the same foil was measured using a Si p-i-n diode with the 28Si ions directly incident on the foil following acceleration. Below the stopping maximum the results are in good agreement with literature data based on Doppler shift measurements of short nuclear lifetimes but are about 20% smaller than the SRIM prediction. Above the stopping maximum the data are in agreement with SRIM within the limits of statistical uncertainty.

Measurements of the stoichiometry of silicon nitride films as a function of the number of incident ions using heavy ion elastic recoil detection (ERD) show that beam-induced nitrogen depletion depends on the projectile species, the beam energy, and the initial stoichiometry. A threshold stoichiometry exists in the range 1.3 > N/Si ≥ 1, below which the films are stable against nitrogen depletion. Above this threshold, depletion is essentially linear with incident fluence. The depletion rate correlates non-linearly with the electronic energy loss of the projectile ion in the film. Sufficiently long exposure of nitrogen-rich films renders the mechanism, which prevents depletion of nitrogen-poor films, ineffective. Compromising depth-resolution, nitrogen depletion from SiN films during ERD analysis can be reduced significantly by using projectile beams with low atomic numbers.

Scanning microbeam Rutherford backscattering spectrometry (mu -RBS) has been employed to investigate local loading effects of non-selective epitaxial growth (NSEG) of SiGe on Si in structures consisting of apertures in an SiO2 mask. The structure sizes were 22 mum x 22 mum. 42 mum x 42 mum, 82 mum x 82 mum and 500 mum x 2000 mum. From the measured thickness and Ge content, it was concluded that in NSEG local loading effects for the structure sizes used are small or absent., QC 20100525

Time of flight-energy (ToF-E) elastic recoil detection analysis (ERDA) data often contains mass signals with considerable overlap from adjacent isotopes in the mass-energy plane. An evaluation has been carried out of the suitability of the dynamic analysis method proposed by Ryan and Jamieson to decompose elemental signals with overlapping mass. This method is shown to work very well on generated test data and the result when it was applied to experimental data appears quite promising. Very accurate mass calibration and lineshape determination was found to be a prerequisite for the application of the method., QC 20100525