A revised analysis of dry oxidation of silicon

Abstract

The anamalous initial regime of silicon dry oxidation is properly demonstrated using derivative plots of experimental data. The proposed analysis, based on the physical Grove–Deal approach, infers that this initial regime cannot be explained either by an enhanced diffusivity of the oxidizing species near the Si-SiO2 interface as previously advanced, or by the chemical model of Blanc. In contrast it is shown that the diffusion through the first hundreds of Å of the oxide layer is slowed down. It is suggested that this lower diffusivity is due to compressive stresses in the growing silica.