High level active <italic>n</italic>+ doping of strained germanium through co-implantation and nanosecond pulsed laser melting.

Obtaining high level active <italic>n</italic>⁺ carrier concentrations in germanium (Ge) has been a significant challenge for further development of Ge devices. By ion implanting phosphorus (P) and fluorine (F) into Ge and restoring crystallinity using Nd:YAG nanosecond pulsed laser melting (PLM), we demonstrate 10²⁰ cm⁻³<italic>n</italic>⁺ carrier concentration in tensile-strained epitaxial germanium-on-silicon. Scanning electron microscopy shows that after laser treatment, samples implanted with P have an ablated surface, whereas P + F co-implanted samples have good crystallinity and a smooth surface topography. We characterize P and F concentration depth profiles using secondary ion mass spectrometry and spreading resistance profiling. The peak carrier concentration, 10²⁰ cm⁻³ at 80 nm below the surface, coincides with the peak F concentration, illustrating the key role of F in increasing donor activation. Cross-sectional transmission electron microscopy of the co-implanted sample shows that the Ge epilayer region damaged during implantation is a single crystal after PLM. High-resolution X-ray diffraction and Raman spectroscopy measurements both indicate that the as-grown epitaxial layer strain is preserved after PLM. These results demonstrate that co-implantation and PLM can achieve the combination of <italic>n</italic>⁺ carrier concentration and strain in Ge epilayers necessary for next-generation, high-performance Ge-on-Si devices. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]