Millisecond flash lamp curing for porosity generation in thin films.

Flash lamp annealing (FLA) with millisecond pulse durations is reported as a novel curing method for pore precursor's degradation in thin films. A case study on the curing of dielectric thin films is presented. FLA-cured films are being investigated by means of positron annihilation spectroscopy (PAS) and Fourier-transform infrared (FTIR) spectroscopy in order to quantify the nm-scale porosity and post-treatment chemistry, respectively.