Photo-Modulated Reflectance for Monitoring of the Annealing of Implanted Si Samples

Abstract: Photo-modulated reflectance (PMR) is a sensitive optical technique applied for monitoring implantation-induced damage in Si wafers. In this work, we demonstrate that PMR is suitable for the characterization of Si wafers annealed by both melting and non-melting laser annealing methods. The PMR signal shows a linear correlation with normalized laser energy density, with R2 = 0.944 (melting) and R2 = 0.957 (non-melting), which is consistent with four-point probe sheet resistance and thermal annealing relation. These results confirm that PMR provides a fast, non-destructive and non-contact metrology for evaluating annealed wafers, offering potential for precise inline process control.