Study on nanohardness of helium-implanted 4H-SiC

The hardness of 4H-SiC, which was high-temperature (500 K) helium-Implanted to fluences of 3 x 10(16) Ions cm(-2) and subsequently thermally annealed at the temperature ranging from 773 to 1273 K, was studied by nanoindentation It is found that the hardness of the implanted 4H-SiC increases at the first, then decreases, and then increases again with increasing annealing tempeature in the temperature range of 500-1273 K, and significant increase in hardness is observed at 773 K. The behavior is ascribed to the changes of the density, length, and tangling of the covalent Si-C bond through the recombination of point defects, clustering of He-vacancy, and growth of helium bubbles during the thermal annealing