An Efficient Molecular Dynamics Scheme for Predicting Dopant Implant Profiles in Semiconductors

The authors present a highly efficient molecular dynamics scheme for calculating the concentration profile of dopants implanted in group-IV alloy, and III-V zinc blende structure materials. The program incorporates methods for reducing computational overhead, plus a rare event algorithm to give statistical accuracy over several orders of magnitude change in the dopant concentration. The code uses a molecular dynamics (MD) model, instead of the binary collision approximation (BCA) used in implant simulators such as TRIM and Marlowe, to describe ion-target interactions. Atomic interactions are described by a combination of 'many-body' and screened Coulomb potentials. Inelastic energy loss is accounted for using a Firsov model, and electronic stopping is described by a Brandt-Kitagawa model which contains the single adjustable parameter for the entire scheme. Thus, the program is easily extensible to new ion-target combinations with the minimum of tuning, and is predictive over a wide range of implant energies and angles. The scheme is especially suited for calculating profiles due to low energy, large angle implants, and for situations where a predictive capability is required with the minimum of experimental validation. They give examples of using their code to calculate concentration profiles and 2D 'point response' profiles of dopants in crystalline silicon, silicon-germanium blends, and gallium-arsenide. They can predict the experimental profiles over five orders of magnitude for <100> and <110> channeling and for non-channeling implants at energies up to hundreds of keV

Microwave-induced thermal escape in Josephson junctions

We investigate, by experiments and numerical simulations, thermal activation processes of Josephson tunnel junctions in the presence of microwave radiation. When the applied signal resonates with the Josephson plasma frequency oscillations, the switching current may become multi-valued in a temperature range far exceeding the classical to quantum crossover temperature. Plots of the switching currents traced as a function of the applied signal frequency show very good agreement with the functional forms expected from Josephson plasma frequency dependencies on the bias current. Throughout, numerical simulations of the corresponding thermally driven classical Josephson junction model show very good agreement with the experimental data.Comment: 10 pages and 4 figure

Molecular dynamics simulation of low energy boron and arsenic implant into silicon

We have studied the implantation of boron and arsenic ions into silicon by classical molecular dynamics simulation. Single ion implant into the dimer reconstructed Si{l_brace}100{r_brace}(2x1) surface has been examined at energies between 0.25 keV and 5.0 keV, at both normal incidence and at non-channeling incidence. By using a new model for electronic stopping, developed for semiconductors and containing only one fitted parameter, we have been able to accurately calculate the depth profile of the implanted B and as atoms. The results of the calculations are compared to the predictions from a binary collision (BC) model for the dopant profile, and to experimental data. This allows us to examine the low energy limits on the validity of the BC approximation, with the aim of producing modifications to the BC model to extend its validity into the sub-keV regime

Dynamic Phases of Vortices in Superconductors with Periodic Pinning

We present results from extensive simulations of driven vortex lattices interacting with periodic arrays of pinning sites. Changing an applied driving force produces a rich variety of novel dynamical plastic flow phases which are very distinct from those observed in systems with random pinning arrays. Signatures of the transition between these different dynamical phases include sudden jumps in the current-voltage curves as well as marked changes in the vortex trajectories and the vortex lattice order. Several dynamical phase diagrams are obtained as a function of commensurability, pinning strength, and spatial order of the pinning sites.Comment: 4 pages, 3 figures. To appear in Physical Review Letters. Movies available at http://www-personal.engin.umich.edu/~nor

Kinetics of macroion coagulation induced by multivalent counterions

Due to the strong correlations between multivalent counterions condensed on a macroion, the net macroion charge changes sign at some critical counterion concentration. This effect is known as the charge inversion. Near this critical concentration the macroion net charge is small. Therefore, short range attractive forces between macroions dominate Coulomb repulsion and lead to their coagulation. The kinetics of macroion coagulation in this range of counterion concentrations is studied. We calculate the Coulomb barrier between two approaching like charged macroions at a given counterion concentration. Two different macroion shapes (spherical and rod-like) are considered. A new "self-regulated" regime of coagulation is found. As the size of aggregates increases, their charge and Coulomb barrier also grow and diminish the sticking probability of aggregates. This leads to a slow, logarithmic increase of the aggregate size with time.Comment: Some formulas correcte

AC induced damping of a fluxon in long Josephson junction

We present a theoretical and experimental study of Josephson vortex (fluxon) moving in the presence of spatially homogeneous dc and ac bias currents. By mapping this problem to the problem of calculating the current-voltage characteristic of a small Josephson junction, we derive the dependence of the average fluxon velocity on the dc bias current. In particular we find that the low frequency ac bias current results in an additional nonlinear damping of fluxon motion. Such ac induced damping crucially depends on the intrinsic damping parameter and increases drastically as this parameter is reduced. We find a good agreement of the analysis with both the direct numerical simulations and the experimentally measured current-voltage characteristics of a long annular Josephson junction with one trapped fluxon.Comment: Physical Review B, in pres

Vortex Dynamics and Defects in Simulated Flux Flow

We present the results of molecular dynamic simulations of a two-dimensional vortex array driven by a uniform current through random pinning centers at zero temperature. We identify two types of flow of the driven array near the depinning threshold. For weak disorder the flux array contains few dislocation and moves via correlated displacements of patches of vortices in a {\it crinkle} motion. As the disorder strength increases, we observe a crossover to a spatially inhomogeneous regime of {\it plastic} flow, with a very defective vortex array and a channel-like structure of the flowing regions. The two regimes are characterized by qualitatively different spatial distribution of vortex velocities. In the crinkle regime the distribution of vortex velocities near threshold has a single maximum that shifts to larger velocities as the driving force is increased. In the plastic regime the distribution of vortex velocities near threshold has a clear bimodal structure that persists upon time-averaging the individual velocities. The bimodal structure of the velocity distribution reflects the coexistence of pinned and flowing regions and is proposed as a quantitative signature of plastic flow.Comment: 12 pages, 13 embedded PostScript figure