Hyperthermal O₃ beam produced by laser ablation of solid-ozone film

In order to obtain a highly concentrated hyperthermal ozone beam for more effective Si oxidation, we performed laser ablation of solid-ozone. A KrF pulse laser was irradiated onto solidified ozone on a sapphire substrate cooled to 30 to 60 K using a cryocooler. A mixture of ozone, molecular oxygen and atomic oxygen was detected using a time-of-flight method through a quadrupole mass filter. The velocity distribution of ablated ozone molecules was almost the same as the distribution at thermal equilibrium. An ozone beam with a fitted temperature of 2500 K and maximum translational energy of 3 eV was obtained under optimum laser conditions.