Temperature-Dependent Defect Production in Bombardment of Semiconductors

Abstract

A model is proposed to explain the observed dependence of the defect production rate on temperature when semiconductors are bombarded with electrons of sufficient energy to produce vacancy-interstitial pairs. The decreased defect density observed after low-temperature bombardment may be due to the production of a metastable vacancy-interstitial pair which may either anneal or form the defect usually observed. A temperature dependence in the production rate arises if these two competing processes have different activation energies.