Fabrication and characterization of uniaxially strained SOI with wafer level by mechanical bending and annealing

The successful introduction and micron-scale characterization of uniaxial strain with wafer level play pivotal roles in designing and optimizing of the silicon-on-insulator (SOI) microstructures for next-generation strained-Si transistors. In this paper, the successful fabrication of uniaxially strained SOI with wafer level by simply mechanical bending and annealing was realized. Employing polarized Raman measurements, the Raman intensity as a function of the angle between the crystal-axis and the polarization-direction of the scattered light for the strained top Si layer demonstrated the uniaxial character of the induced strain. Micro-Raman measurements revealed that the strain was uniaxially compressive with 0.114% strain value. The transmission electron microscopy characterization was used to reveal the little effect of process on crystallinity, which was confirmed by XRD measurements. The crystal symmetry change from cubic to tetragonal structure of the strained Si was further discussed.