System-level change is crucial for solving society's most pressing problems. However, individual-level interventions may be useful for creating behavioral change before system-level change is in place and for increasing necessary public support for system-level solutions. Participating in individual-level solutions may increase support for system-level solutions – especially if the individual-level solutions are internalized as part of one's social identity.

Results are reported of a Deep Level Transient Spectroscopy (DLTS) study of the conversion of the divacancy, with energy level at Ev+0.19eV, to a level at Ev+0.24eV after anneal at temperatures below its dissociation temperature (300°C). In literature both levels have been associated with the donor level of the divacancy.

Diodes processed on p-type Float Zone (FZ) and Czochralski (Cz) silicon wafers with boron concentration between 0.2 and 3E15 cm−3 are irradiated with 2 MeV electrons. Before and after anneal (200°C and 250°C) DLTS spectra are recorded to get a full electrical characterisation of the induced defects.

The observed conversion is proposed to be a gradual transformation of the divacancy to a divacancy-oxygen complex.

Epitaxial CoSi2 layers on Si substrates have been amorphized with Co and/or Si ion implantation. The influence of nonstoichiometry on the rate of solid-phase epitaxial growth (SPEG) of amorphized CoSi2 has been investigated with time-resolved reflectivity, Rutherford backscattering spectrometry and Mossbauer spectrometry, the latter with radioactive 57Co probes. A decrease in SPEG rate was apparent with an increase in nonstoichiometry. For a given ion dose, the decrease was greater following Co implantation. The means by which non-stoichiometry is accommodated in a crystalline CoSi2 lattice - either through phase separation or defect formation - has been considered. SPEG rate retardation was also evident in samples implanted with both Si and Co ions with a Si:Co dose ratio of 2:1. Additional mechanisms may thus also contribute to the observed SPEG rate reduction.

Heteroepitaxial CoxNi1-xSi2 layers with good crystalline quality have been formed by ion beam synthesis. Rutherford Backscattering (RBS) - Channeling, Auger Electron Spectroscopy (AES), Transmission Electron Microscopy (TEM) and X-Ray Diffraction (XRD) have been used to study the buried layers. For a sample with x=0.66, we found that this ternary suicide layer contains 11% type B and 89 % type A orientation. The TEM investigation reveals that the type B component is mainly located at the interfaces with a thickness of a few monolayers. XRD studies show that the strain of the type B component is smaller than that of the type A component, and this is probably the reason for such a unique distribution of the type B component in the epilayer.

Heteroepitaxial CoxNi1−xSi2 layers with good crystalline quality have been formed by ion beam synthesis. Rutherford Backscattering (RBS) - Channeling, Auger Electron Spectroscopy (AES), Transmission Electron Microscopy (TEM) and X-Ray Diffraction (XRD) have been used to study the buried layers. For a sample with x=0.66, we found that this ternary silicide layer contains 11% type B and 89% type A orientation. The TEM investigation reveals that the type B component is mainly located at the interfaces with a thickness of a few monolayers. XRD studies show that the strain of the type B component is smaller than that of the type A component, and this is probably the reason for such a unique distribution of the type B component in the epilayer.

An unusual Ni distribution with two completely separated buried and surface suicide layers has been observed after Ni ion implantation in Si(111) kept at a temperature of 300° C, with a dose of 1.1 × 1017/cm2 and at a fixed energy of 90 keV. RBS/channeling, AES and cross-sectional TEM have been used to study this phenomenon as a function of the substrate temperature and Co co4mplantation. A model is presented, based on the diffusion of the transition metal, the defect annealing during the implantation, and the gettering power of the surface and the end of range defects.