To provide a semiconductor epitaxial wafer having an epitaxial layer with excellent crystallinity, the semiconductor epitaxial wafer is a semiconductor epitaxial wafer in which an epitaxial layer is formed on a surface of a semiconductor wafer, and the peak of the hydrogen concentration profile detected by SIMS lies in a surface portion of the semiconductor wafer on the side where the on the side where the epitaxial layer is formed.

A device such as a medical device and a method for making same provides a device surfaces modified by beam irradiation, such as a gas cluster ion beams or a neutral beam, to inhibit or delay attachment or activation or clotting of platelets or to match surface energy of the device to that of a protein with the property of inhibition of bacterial colonization that can coat the all or part of the device surface to effect such inhibition.

A method of producing a semiconductor epitaxial wafer is provided. The method includes irradiating a surface of a semiconductor wafer with cluster ions to form a modified layer in a surface portion of the semiconductor wafer, in which the modified layer includes a constituent element of the cluster ions in solid solution. The method further includes forming an epitaxial layer on the modified layer of the semiconductor wafer. The irradiating is performed such that a portion of the modified layer in a thickness direction becomes an amorphous layer, and an average depth of an amorphous layer surface from a semiconductor wafer surface-side of the amorphous layer is at least 20 nm from the surface of the semiconductor wafer.

A method of forming a method of forming a semiconductor device includes providing a semiconductor structure, etching back each gate structure of a plurality of gate structures to form an opening, forming a barrier layer over the dielectric layer, forming a sacrificial layer over the barrier layer, planarizing the sacrificial layer till a surface of the sacrificial layer is substantially flat, and using a gas cluster ion beam (GCIB) process to planarize the sacrificial layer and the barrier layer, and to remove the sacrificial layer and to provide a planarized barrier layer. The semiconductor structure includes a semiconductor substrate, a fin, the plurality of gate structures, and a dielectric layer over the semiconductor substrate between adjacent gate structures. A top of the dielectric layer is coplanar with a top of each of the plurality of gate structures.

A method of processing a trench, via, hole, recess, void, or other feature that extends a depth into a substrate to a base or bottom and has an opening by irradiation with an accelerated neutral beam derived from an accelerated gas cluster ion beam for processing materials at the base or bottom of the opening.

The method of producing a semiconductor epitaxial wafer includes: a first step of irradiating a surface of a semiconductor wafer with cluster ions containing carbon, phosphorus, and hydrogen as constituent elements to form a modified layer that is located in a surface layer portion of the semiconductor wafer and that contains the constituent elements of the cluster ions as a solid solution; and a second step of forming an epitaxial layer on the modified layer of the semiconductor wafer. The ratio y/x of the number y of the phosphorus atoms with respect to the number x of the carbon atoms satisfies 0.5 or more and 2.0 or less, where the number of atoms of carbon, phosphorus, and hydrogen in the cluster ions is expressed by C.sub.xP.sub.yH.sub.z (x, y, and z are integers each equal to or more than 1).

Provided is a method of producing a semiconductor epitaxial wafer having enhanced gettering ability. The method of producing a semiconductor epitaxial wafer includes: a first step of irradiating a surface of a semiconductor wafer with cluster ions containing carbon, hydrogen, and nitrogen as constituent elements to form a modified layer that is located in a surface portion of the semiconductor wafer and contains the constituent elements of the cluster ions as a solid solution; and a second step of forming an epitaxial layer on the modified layer of the semiconductor wafer.

A method for removing amorphous regions from a surface of a crystal substrate uses an accelerated neutral beam including reactive gas species for removing or reactively modifying material surfaces without sputtering. Accelerated neutral atom beam enabled surface reactions remove surface contaminants from substrate surfaces to create an interface region with exposed crystal lattice in preparation for next phase processing.

An epitaxial wafer that includes a silicon wafer and an epitaxial layer on the silicon wafer. The silicon wafer contains hydrogen that has a concentration profile including a first peak and a second peak. A hydrogen peak concentration of the first peak and a hydrogen peak concentration of the second peak are each not less than 1×10.sup.17 atoms/cm.sup.3.

The present invention relates to an inorganic alignment film forming apparatus for forming an inorganic alignment film on a substrate, the apparatus comprising: a sputtering means; and an ion beam irradiation means for performing surface treatment on an inorganic alignment film formed by the sputtering means, wherein the sputtering means comprises a stage on which a substrate for forming the inorganic alignment film is arranged, at least one sputtering gun, and a sputtering mask arranged between the stage and the sputtering gun, the ion beam irradiation means comprises a stage on which the substrate is arranged, an ion beam emission unit for generating ions and irradiating the substrate with ions, and an ion beam irradiation mask arranged between the stage and the ion beam emission unit, and the sputtering mask and the ion beam irradiation mask have a plurality of inclined opening parts.