New theory of the thermal oxidation of silicon

Abstract

The growth kinetics of SiO/sub 2/ films on silicon is developed. A simple model of oxidation takes into account the reactions occurring in bulk and at the two interfaces of the oxide layer as well as the diffusion process for atomic oxygen and diffusion approximation for calculation of the coefficients of kinetic reactions. The relationship is shown to be in excellent agreement with oxidation data obtained over a range of temperature (800/spl deg/-1200/spl deg/C), and oxide thickness (6-400 /spl Aring/) for O/sub 2/ and N/sub 2/O ambient oxidation.